Tonight’s movie is TWISTERS, considered a stand-alone film and a follow-up, but not necessarily a sequel to the 1996 film with a similar name and which starred a passel of actors, many with recognizable faces who drew us into the world of storm chasing, particularly one kind of storm: tornados.
I can confirm that the 1996 film, TWISTER, and 2024’s TWISTERS are, for the most part, stand-alone films. While the current film casts allusions to the earlier film, they are two very different films in structure and story.
Unlike the original, the current film doesn’t give a timeframe aside from “FIVE YEARS LATER”, where most of the action of this film takes place after an opening set piece.
From my perspective, five years ago, we’re introduced to a group of Muskogee State College students who are trying to verify a theory by Kate Carter that using a certain chemical compound, the power of a tornado can be dissipated. Kate is working with four other students, including her boyfriend Jeb, and another close friend, Javi.
Kate and her team are pulling a trailer full of barrels of her chemical and a Dorothy V [five] device filled with the same sensors we saw Jo and her team use in 1996. Kate’s team locates an F1 tornado and places the barrels in the tornado’s path while Javi lingers back to launch the sensors and monitor the chemical’s reaction. At first, it appears that the chemical works, but then suddenly, disaster strikes and the tornado becomes massive and threatens Kate and her team.
FIVE YEARS LATER, Kate is working for NOAA in New York City when she suddenly gets a visit from Javi who wants Kate to come back to Oklahoma and work with his new company and his new portable radar to 3D model a tornado to learn more about them. At first, Kate refuses and Javi returns to Oklahoma. However, Javi sends her a news story about a town being destroyed and Kate decides to return to Oklahoma and give him and his radar a week to work.
While Javi introduces the rest of his company’s team to Kate, we are introduced to Tyler Owens, a self-described tornado wrangler and YouTube personality who does things like live-stream shooting fireworks inside an active tornado… from the inside. Seeing that Javi has brought a new person aboard, Tyler tries to get inside her head to discover which tornado she’s going to chase.
There are several parallels between this film and the 1996 film. A traumatic event spurs our heroine into action, or in Kate’s case inaction. Tyler tries to get information from Kate in the same way Jonas Miller tried to get information from Jo about her husband’s instincts about chasing. The increasing peril each tornado brings is greater than the last one.
However, the screenwriter seems to have deliberately reversed the roles we might expect. In the original “Twister,” Jo’s team was the scrappy underdog, while Jonas’s team represented the well-funded establishment. In “Twisters,” it’s Javi’s team that appears polished and professional, while Tyler’s team embodies the daredevil spirit. Still, not everything is as it appears.
Curiously, the film introduces numerous amateur storm chasers who could have served as a cautionary tale, demonstrating the dangers of inexperience. However, this potential plot point remains largely unexplored.
One major disappointment for me was the score by Benjamin Wallfisch. It lacked the energy and excitement of Mark Mancina’s original score, which would have greatly enhanced the film’s intensity. I saw the film in IMAX, but the format felt unnecessary and didn’t add much to the experience. The sound design was underwhelming, and the direction of Lee Isaac Chung was somewhat reserved.
The tornadoes themselves, which were so vividly characterized in the original TWISTER, seemed somewhat formless and less menacing in this sequel. Even the fire tornado, caused by an entire refinery exploding, failed to impress.
Interestingly, the film hints at a potential sequel through a montage of future events, suggesting that Javi, Tyler, and Kate ultimately join forces. This technique sometimes called a flashforward or a post-credits scene without the credits, offers an intriguing glimpse into the characters’ future paths.
So, you may think with all my nitpicking, that I didn’t like TWISTERS. You’d be wrong.
A few weeks ago we introduced this corollary to my mantra:
EXPECTATIONS SUBVERT ENJOYMENT.
If you’ve been following along, you know that my anticipation for TWISTERS was sky-high; it was inevitable that TWISTERS would suffer in comparison to TWISTER.
If you’ve done no research, you’d never know that Daisy Edgar-Jones is an English actress as she totally nailed her American accent.
Glen Powell continues to amaze. He is one breakthrough performance from being a major star. He’s done a lot of work recently, in different genres, and he’s one to watch. I await the one major role where you say, “Nobody else could play this role.”
Anthony Ramos again put in Yeoman’s work as Javi and David Corenswet, James Gunn’s Superman, as Javi’s business partner, Scott does a nice counterpoint performance to his future role as a man who seems jealous of Javi’s intimacy with Kate.
Finally, Brandon Perea stands out as part of Tyler’s crew along with Katy O’Brian, Sasha Lane, and Tunde Adebimpe.
Frankly, Joseph Kosinski’s screen story and Mark L. Smith’s screenplay could have been stronger, but the actors’ performances overcame those weaknesses.
On the ten-point scale from trakt.tv that I use to rate content, I wavered between giving TWISTERS a six or a seven, but recognizing that my expectations of a movie I’ve loved for 28 years, I’m giving its spiritual sequel a seven out of ten. That’s equivalent to three and a half stars on a five-star scale.
As always:
WATCH CONTENT; FORM OPINION.
You’ve just heard mine; I’d like to hear yours.
Ciao for now!
Mikeylito @LEISURE 