Steve Concotelli
Few movie props are more iconic than Doc Brown’s time machine from Back to the Future. The famed DeLorean, which delivered Marty McFly across 130 years and three movies, was decked out with a thick layer of wires, tubes, lights and awesomeness.
After its final film, the stainless steel vehicle was left out in the elements at Universal Studios Hollywood theme park. Fans stole parts for souvenirs. Animals took to living in it. No one considered putting it in a garage.
Steve Concotelli’s documentary OUTATIME: Saving the DeLorean Time Machine chronicles the transformation of the machine from literal rat’s nest to museum-ready artifact. Concotelli studied film at UW-Madison and also produced and directed public access shows on WYOU in the mid-1990s before heading to Los Angeles to work in television production. This is his first full-length project, and it can be purchased online or streamed on iTunes, Amazon or other platforms.
Concotelli’s movie follows Joe Walser, the perfectionist head of restoration, who leads his “team of lunatics” in their yearlong process. It is an all-volunteer crew made up of fans who want to help salvage their childhood dream car. Along the way, we meet an array of people with historic connections to the time machine, ranging from writer/producer Bob Gale — who first dreamed up Back to the Future — to a Doc Brown impersonator who has probably spent more time with the machine than anyone.
OUTATIME works best as an excellent illustration of the efforts it takes to preserve history. The project required an obsessive attention to detail, months of tracking down authentic parts and a lot of creative problem solving. On the surface, the project might not seem as worthy as restoring a 19th-century theater or Beethoven’s childhood home, but the DeLorean is such a familiar piece of culture that its deterioration feels criminal and its salvation vitally important. The preservation of this bit of our shared past is what elevates OUTATIME above an episode of WheelerDealers or Top Gear.
