“Hollywood boldly went where it hadn’t gone before and Nashawaty chronicles the journeys.”
—Los Angeles Times
("Books You Need To Read This Summer")
“Written with a fan’s enthusiasm . . . An important inflection point in Hollywood filmmaking.”
—
New York Times
("Nonfiction Books to Read This Summer")
In the summer of 1982, eight science fiction films were released within six weeks of one another.
E.T., Tron, Star Trek: Wrath of Khan, Conan the Barbarian, Blade Runner, Poltergeist, The Thing
, and
Mad Max: The Road Warrior c
hanged the careers of some of Hollywood's now biggest names—altering the art of movie-making to this day.
In
The Future Was Now
, Chris Nashawaty recounts the riotous genesis of these films, featuring an all-star cast of Hollywood luminaries and gadflies alike: Steven Spielberg, at the height of his powers, conceives
E.T.
as an unlikely family tale, and quietly takes over the troubled production of
Poltergeist
, a horror film he had been nurturing for years. Ridley Scott, fresh off the success of
Alien
, tries his hand at an odd Philip K. Dick story that becomes
Blade Runner
a box office failure turned cult classic. Similar stories arise for films like
Tron, Conan the Barbarian,
and
The Thing.
Taken as a whole, these films show a precarious turning-point in Hollywood history, when baffled film executives finally began to understand the potential of high-concept films with a rabid fanbase, merchandising potential, and endless possible sequels.
Expertly researched, energetically told, and written with an unabashed love for the cinema,
is a chronicle of how the revolution sparked in a galaxy far, far away finally took root and changed Hollywood forever.