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Race to make world like Back to the Future II by 2015 behind schedule

THE project to create the technologies and trends of Back to the Future II is now more than 18 months behind schedule.

The ambitious sequel screened in 1989 served up a positive and realistic vision of 2015 which was enough to convince investors to back the scheme.

But with less than three years to go hoverboards, food hydrators and neon golf visors are still stuck on the drawing board.

Despite the setbacks, Back to the future II chief executive Tom Logan remains optimistic about meeting what many now consider an impossible deadline.

He said: “I assure you come October 2015 the world will be ready. Yes we’ve hit some snags but the framework is in place.

“Take a look at the sky. You’ll see that the mid-air freeways have been built, now all we need to do is invent and popularise the flying car so there’s something to run on them.”

The project has already been under scrutiny for investing too heavily in the development of a holographic shark only to see the Jaws franchise they were intended to promote collapse after the one that Michael Caine was in.

Logan insisted: “Can we invent self-drying jackets or self-fastening trainers? No we cannot. But cameras everywhere and in-your-face advertising on anything with a screen? That we can do. Even if there is no demand for it whatsoever.”

Logan has now appealed for a second round of funding, adding: “To make this work we need money. And by money I mean cash, not some unrealistic database currency where you pay with your thumb. That’s never going to happen.

“I assure you this project won’t be a repeat of the failed Space 1999 committee, and that if we don’t deliver on our Back to the Future II promise, I will eat this double neck tie.”

Jodie Foster's intensely private HMV memories

First off, what makes you think you’ve got the right to ask me about my HMV memories? My memories are private. PRIVATE god dammit.

So, I suppose you’re just gonna say “I know what Jodie Foster’s first ever album was”, right? You’re gonna say it was Fistful of Alice by Alice Cooper, or Feels Like the Fist Time by Foreigner or Introducing the Hard Fist According to Terence Trent D’Arby. Well, they might have been the kind of albums you bought, but not me.

Mel, you with me? Remember the twelve inch? I think you do. We don’t need another hero, is all I’m sayin’, Mel. That was a bit of code between me and Mel, there.

I’ll come right out and say it: the first album I bought was on vinyl. You don’t remember vinyl, huh? Back in the day, going to HMV was a magical, dreamlike experience where you didn’t have to pay for anything – like going to the moon, or better still blasting off to the edge of space like I did in my 1997 movie, Contact.

Every Saturday afternoon I’d get lost in aisles of legendary seminal works: Straits, ZZ, Winwood, Aswad – oh, boy! Later, I’d have to be forceably aroused by the staff after I’d slip into another dimension listening to Level 42 on the big headphones.

They’d find me in the fetal position with a big wet patch on my shorts, muttering “I’m okay to go” over and over. They were my family, my brothers in life – and in arms. I wanna thank you guys.

That vinyl smell – there’s something no one ever talks about. I would immediately get so immersed in the album sleeve that I would bring it closer and closer to my face until I’d end up walking home with it fully wedged over my head. The day I bought No Jacket Required, the bus conductor never even asked to see my ticket. It was the most beautiful time of my life.

I have sniffed literally thousands of sleeves since then, hoping to recapture that joy but it’s been futile – even people with prosthetic arms are a disappointment. One time, during the filming of Nell, I accidentally sniffed Liam Neeson’s sleeve and it was revolting. Somewhere between an incontinent leper and used dental floss. Don’t do it, Mel.

Now that I’ve ended the speculation for good, I hope you can stop your obscene fascination at my HMV memories, like a room full of pervy John Hinckleys.

Hows about a woop woop for privacy, brothers and sisters? Mel, sit down.

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