How realistic was the movie "Twister"?

[Verne Carlson]

LOL - those were great Chris! :lol:

If you ever get a chance watch Twister on DVD with the directors comments on. (Yeah, I get bored sometimes)

They have Jan Debont (sp?) and the guy who did the visual effects commenting on it. It was hillarious! The visual effects guy
asks Debont why something exploded on top of hailstone hill?? Later, when the 18-wheeler gas truck explodes, he says something like 'it's an action movie, we need explosions' and then when Jonas's SUV explodes he says 'oh yeah its been 30 minutes - time for an explosion'

He's totally ripping on his own movie. :lol: :lol:

 

[Dave Gallaher]

Not to belabor the point, but the most amazing thing about watching those explosions was the lack of continuity--a factor that is usually watched with some degree of quality/reality control in mind. But they were sleeping when they allowed large flaming clouds to float lazily straight up while everything else was flying across the screen in the simulated windfield.


Perhaps there was not a reliable way to film a fireball influenced by a cinematic wind machine to dub into the production.

Dave Gallaher
Huntsville, AL

 

[Mike Mezeul II]

I got quite a kick out of this. On the back of the video box for Twister, it states its rated PG-13 for, get this... "Intense depiction of very bad weather"!! I was rolling around on the floor with tears in my eyes after reading that one!

 

[Scott Udell]

I've recently wondered if they could've made a more realistic movie and still gotten the fun action flick they were aiming for? Here's a question: how would you redo the questionable scenes while still keeping them interesting?

(I confess, even after reading all the flaws in it, I still enjoy the flick! )

 

[Perry Williams]

Twister lost my interest within the first five minutes....at least regarding accuracy.

For example, Jo Harding's dad was supposedly sucked out of his storm cellar and killed by a F5 tornado in Oklahoma during 1969...and there WASN'T an F5 tornado anywhere in America in 1969. In fact, there wasn't even a F4 in the state of Oklahoma during 1969.

Also, the fact Jo's farmer dad supposedly knew about something (Fujita-Pearson intensity scale) which didn't exist until several years later was a major gaffe..

It was a fun movie to watch (especially since I'm a fan of both Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt)....but the lack of research/ accuracy into past Oklahoma tornadoes was dissapointing to me.

 

[Laura Good Buffalo]

Twister was a good watch from an entertainment standpoint to me. but the more I learn, the more the science sucks. also, did anyone notice how many times they were under total cloud cover, but when they switched to inside the truck, it was full sunlight complete with strong shadows? and did anyone catch the scene where they were on a deserted road with a tornado right in front of them, then they switched to an inside the truck shot, and you could see a car going by them the other direction, once again in full sunlight? and yes, the ice chips sucked.

 

[Darren Addy]

As an old photographer, I'm especially sensitive to lighting gaffs in movies. So much so that I have to control myself or people may not enjoy watching movies with me.

Darren Addy
Kearney, NE

 

[Steve Miller TX]

The only thing I got out of "Twister" was a hearty laugh and a life-long obsession for a chase partner like Helen Hunt. :wink: I should also throw in the most worn-out and now irritating question I always get from people when they find out I chase storms. Good grief! I now count down the number of seconds before they ask what I thought about "Twister"...just for grins. :wink: That ranks second with "Fly Like An Eagle" regarding my namesake.

If you watch it, look carefully in the background while they are supposedly traveling through OK....you'll see Texas FM road signs. The crushed ice that they got from an ice machine supposedly representing hail was hilarious. I would have loved to have seen "behind the scene" to see a bunch of stage hands throwing handfulls of ice at the truck. LOL! I could go on, but I digress.

It's Hollywood, folks. What else didya expect? Definitely my favorite comedy of all-time. :lol:

 

[Morgan Palmer]

I'm the world's worst at picking apart movies, and I needed a legal pad for this one.

It seemed the storms in the movie blew up out of nowhere and were tornadoing within minutes. Then, once the tornado had managed to pass right over them, the skies parted a-la C.B. Demille and everyone went back to Defcon 5.

A little dramatic interlude and it's back again.

Unless the day was already busted, I likely would not being stopped at Auntie so-and-so to have "chicken fry" and not paying attention to what's around me.

That is, as mentioned above, unless Helen Hunt asked me to.
mp

 

[Chris Sokol]

For example, Jo Harding's dad was supposedly sucked out of his storm cellar and killed by a F5 tornado in Oklahoma during 1969...and there WASN'T an F5 tornado anywhere in America in 1969. In fact, there wasn't even a F4 in the state of Oklahoma during 1969.

Actually there wasn't an F-rated tornado period, as the Fujita scale had not been invented yet.

 

[Chris Sokol]

BTW....speaking of tornado movies...there is one on Sci Fi this weekend called "Tornado: Nature Unleashed"(2004). I think that one viewers comment probabbly sums it all up:

OMG! What the hell is this?

Interesting note....Tornado: Nature Unleashed is what Sci Fi calls it, but every other reference to the movie has it titled Nature Unleashed: Tornado.

 

[Fred Gossage]

From Dish Network's on-screen program guide:

Movie. Daniel Bernhardt, Ruth Platt, Casper Zafer. (2004) A massive tornado threatens the lives of a journalist, a producer, and a town of Gypsies

OOOOOkkkkkaaaayyyyyy.......yeah :roll: :roll: :lol: :lol:

 

[Traci Heath]

One of the funny things I thought about with the movie Twister was how everytime they were in a tornado it would disapate. The tornado would not move on.

 

[Rob_Davis]

I got quite a kick out of this. On the back of the video box for Twister, it states its rated PG-13 for, get this... "Intense depiction of very bad weather"!!

Maybe it was a misprint. Surely, they must have meant to say:

"Very bad depiction of intense weather." :lol:

 

[Robert Edmonds]

I'm not going rooting for the movie. I just was thinking that it might have been a little hard for the computers of the time to develop storms to the degree of accuracy you guys want. I played with 3ds max, (crated the effects to Armageddon, I believe) and it takes computers today with the software a long time to produce nice weather effects. I could see maybe the computers that made the movie final fantasy doing a better job. As a joke for you guys.... Maybe twister should do what star wars did, make a new digitally enhanced version!