The Marty McFly - Gremlins connection revealed!

I scratched another Saturn Award winner for Best Horror Film off my list of movies to watch earlier today, and this time around, it was 1984 winner, “Gremlins.”
I’d seen this movie before, but it had been a while, maybe more than 10 years. In that time, I’d forgotten how entertaining this movie actually was. Likely due to the large media build-up to this movie and its sequel, I can actually remember when this movie came out. I think I was in the third grade.
For those of you who are unfamiliar with “Gremlins,” it’s about a young man who receives a cute, furry creature as a Christmas present from his dad, who’s a traveling salesman and inventor. The dad, played by Hoyt Axton, buys the creature, called a Mogwai, from a back alley store in Chinatown and is given a set of rules to follow regarding the creature:
1. Keep it away from bright light. (Sunlight will kill it.)
2. Don’t expose the creature to water.
3. Don’t feed it after midnight.
Of course, it doesn’t take long for all three of these rules to be broken as soon as dad brings the Mogwai home, and the pet, which they call Gizmo, goes on to spawn hundreds of small, destructive, reptilian monsters. They cause havoc all over the small town of Kingston Falls before the lead character – the son, Billy Peltzer – can bring an end to it all. This film featured a number of well-known actors including Phoebe Cates, Judge Reinhold and Corey Feldman.
One interesting bit of trivia about this movie is that it was shot on the same set as 1985’s “Back to the Future.” Both movies were filmed on the Universal Studios back lot. According to the Internet Movie Database, the theater that blows up near the end of “Gremlins” was also involved in another accident when Marty McFly in “Back to the Future” smashes into the front entrance at the end of that film. The theater then burned down with the rest of the buildings in a fire that happened right after the filming of 1989’s “Back to the Future II.”
In the end, I enjoyed re-watching “Gremlins.” It was a nice trip down memory lane, and reminded me of just how good this movie actually was. From here, it’s on to the 1985 Saturn Award winner for Best Horror Film, “Fright Night.”