Film Review – Twisters

July 20th, 2024 | POSTED BY Allen Almachar

The latest trend of legacy sequels continues with Twisters (2024). This time, rather than bringing back familiar actors from the 1996 hit Twister, the production decided to create a standalone narrative with new characters. Of course, that doesn’t mean we don’t get our fair share of references to the past. Fans of the original will see plenty of similarities, from the plot beats, character traits, and set pieces. With advancements in technology, the disaster elements are bigger and badder. The scale of destruction is exponentially more extreme than what we got nearly three decades ago. But does that make for a better overall film? The answer to that is a little hazy.

While I wouldn’t call myself the biggest fan of Twister, there is a goofiness to it that made it kind of endearing. Jan de Bont directed it with plenty of energy and flash, and the repartee between Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt acts as the anchor amid the chaos. In fact, if we were to remove all the disaster elements, what’s left is a fairly entertaining screwball rom-com. Squint really hard and you could basically see it as His Girl Friday (1939), but instead of people chasing big news stories, they chase big tornadoes. Twisters contains some of this, but not nearly enough. Director Lee Isaac Chung – whose previous feature was the drama Minari (2020) – does everything required for a big summer blockbuster but adds an underlying seriousness that doesn’t quite blend as it should.

Don’t get me wrong, when the movie wants to be a fun “Mother Nature Gone Amuck” romp, it does so with fireworks. The special effects and sound design puts us right in the middle of the swirling winds and flashing lights. The action is tailor made for the big screen. Chung’s direction adds some clever tongue-in-cheek sequences to highlight this notion. During one intense scene, a tornado rips a movie theater open, pulling the screen out altogether. The people in the theater look out to where the screen was only to see the tornado’s wrath happening in front of them. It’s a meta moment, where we (the actual audience) are looking at a screen filled with people (in the movie) watching a twister happening in front of them. You’ll be hard pressed to find a more wrap around argument for the theater-going experience than that!

If the runtime was filled with merely the tornado chasing, then that would be more than enough to whet our action appetites. Unfortunately, screenwriter Mark L. Smith and Joseph Kosinski (who is given a story credit) fill the space between the high points with characters that lack depth or chemistry with one another. Daisy Edgar-Jones plays Kate, a storm chaser whom, after a tragic accident, resigns herself to a desk job. She gets lured back into the game by her friend Javi (Anthony Ramos) who has been given corporate backing to better study the movements of tornadoes. Things get complicated when Kate crosses paths with Tyler (Glen Powell) a self-proclaimed tornado “wrangler” who gained fame by streaming his exploits on YouTube. The three create a friendly competition over who can better chase down, study, and even disrupt these powerful cyclones.

The writing arranges Kate, Tyler, and Javi into a semi-love triangle. Where Twister brought the romantic elements to the forefront, Twisters tip toes around the topic as though it were afraid of people being drawn to one another. Yes, falling in love while chasing tornadoes is silly and dumb, but isn’t that what we want from this type of movie? The lack of chemistry amongst the characters reflects the imbalance in casting. Glen Powell is shot and framed like a MOVIE STAR – every angle amplifies his million-dollar smile and razor-sharp chin. Sadly, Daisy Edgar-Jones and Anthony Ramos (who are very talented performers in their own right) are not given enough opportunity to make their characters shine. Powell is made to look like a Grade A superstar and everyone else is relegated to his supporting staff.

The film makes specific effort to examine the aftereffects of the tornado attacks. We get a sense of the enormity of the destruction. Scene after scene show small Oklahoma town centers flattened, scrap metal strewn everywhere, and all sorts of rubble littered down the streets. It reminded me of the memorable scene in War of the Worlds (2005), where we witness an entire community leveled to a crisp. In Twisters, we are given that scene multiple times. One could correlate these images with the dangers of climate change, and how weather has become noticeably more severe in recent years. It’s a commendable attempt for Chung and the rest of the production to add these serious touches, but I don’t know if they fit within the overall tone. For something that is marketed as an off the wall, over-the-top extravaganza, to inject these moments of people losing their homes and rescue workers trying to save lives adds a somber cloud to the proceedings. Are we supposed to be having a good time here? These instances work like a wet blanket, putting a damper on things and sucking the energy out of the room.

For the most part, Twisters does precisely what it is supposed to do: provide high octane action and edge of your seat thrills. It only hits a roadblock when it tries to be more than that. I’m all for movies that offer more than just sheer escapism. Sometimes, tying one’s narrative to real world themes or legitimate character development can be a good thing. Other times, though, you just want some good old fashioned junk food cinema.

Anthony Ramos, Bill Paxton, Daisy Edgar-Jones, Featured, Glen Powell, Helen Hunt, His Girl Friday, Jan de Bont, Joseph Kosinski, Lee Isaac Chung, Mark L. Smith, Minari, Twister, Twisters, War of the Worlds