The Texas Theatre is Celebrating the Cinema of 1982 with ‘The Future Was Now’

Cultural shifts rarely happen in an instant, but there are times when you can mark a period as having had an outsized influence on everything that came after. "Future Was Now," a series of screenings presented by creative agency Talented Friends, is based on one such influential period: the summer of 1982, when some of the most beloved science fiction films of all time hit theaters within weeks of one another.

Every Wednesday from now through the first week of August, Dallas moviegoers can visit the Texas Theatre (or the Majestic Theatre on July 30) to enjoy a seminal science fiction classic on the big screen.

The series is inspired by Chris Nashawaty’s 2024 book 'The Future Was Now: Madmen, Mavericks, and the Epic Sci-Fi Summer of 1982,' which explores this phenomenal stretch of movie releases. In the wake of Star Wars, science fiction blockbusters were popular, and it just so happened that a number of these features landed in front of American audiences in this brief period.

The book covers films that are all screening at the Texas Theatre, including Mad Max: The Road Warrior, The Thing, Poltergeist (on 35mm), Blade Runner and Conan the Barbarian. Additionally, a screening of Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan will take place at the Majestic Theatre on July 30, with William Shatner in attendance. The book also covers other films from that storied summer, including Tron and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial.

Jason Reimer, co-owner of the Texas Theatre and co-founder of Talented Friends, was inspired to program the series after reading Nashawaty’s book. It was an opportunity to let audiences experience these incredible films on the big screen in rapid succession, just like they would have been able to in 1982.

“That book is… I keep suggesting to everyone, if you’re a film nerd, it’s a really quick read, super fun,” says Reimer. He was reading the book last year when filmmaker Oliver Stone came to the Texas Theatre, and was able to strike up a conversation with Stone about his work writing Conan the Barbarian.

While Reimer is excited to bring the entire suite of films to Dallas, he says he is especially looking forward to the July 16 screening of Poltergeist on 35mm.

“It’s an original print, which means it’s from 1982 itself,” he explains. “As far as we know it hasn’t been screened much, if at all.”

Having an original 35mm print adds to the verisimilitude of the entire series. Reimer says the theater team tries to work in “easter eggs” like that when they have a “highly curated” set of screenings on the docket.

Of course, the Texas Theatre regularly brings rare and classic films to Dallas, but what makes a series like "Future Was Now" special is having a narrative spine to attach the films to. Reimer says being able to “bracket” the screenings and turn them into more of an extended event makes programming more fun. Last year, he ran a similar series based on Brian Raftery’s 'Best. Movie. Year. Ever.: How 1999 Blew Up the Big Screen.'

Though Nashawaty is not directly involved in the screenings, he and Reimer have communicated, and anyone interested in picking up a copy of his book is in luck, as the hardcover is available from local booksellers. The paperback edition is due out on July 29, just before the screening series at the Texas Theatre wraps up.

Flash forward more than 40 years and the films being screened for "Future Was Now" still loom large over our culture. Some of them have sequels and spin-offs that are being produced today, while others simply sparked the public’s imagination during an era of film-making that inspired the decades to come.