JamesCaruso
Staff member
(Caution - potential spoilers)
Saw it with the whole family yesterday, Sunday afternoon, at a 3:50pm IMAX show. Avoided reading any of the reviews here so that I could go in without any prejudices or spoilers. Still haven’t read any of the posts here so that I could write about first impressions without any other influences - so apologies in advance if any of this is redundant with earlier posts.
After sitting through endless previews in the theater, it was a pretty cool feeling when the lights were turned down and the first images and sounds of “Twisters” finally appeared. After all the speculation and 28 (!) years since the original, Twisters was about to begin!!!
There is an inherent and unavoidable duality for us in a movie like this. On one side of the coin: What could be better than a movie about storm chasing?!? Despite our perceptions of how many more people are doing it, or how much more familiar it has become to the mainstream public, fact is storm chasing is a tiny niche interest relative to the size of the US population, let alone the world. To see a major motion picture based on it, to immerse yourself in a fictional chasing world for two hours, is simply fantastic. On the other side of the coin, we are doomed to view the movie through the lens of actual storm chasers with knowledge of severe weather. While every viewer has to suspend disbelief, we have to take it to another level to avoid parsing every word of dialogue. While the general audience knows certain things are exaggerated and just sits there happily and obliviously enjoying it, we tend to get irritated by those same scenes.
Also, one thing both chasers and non-chasers would share would be the tendency to make comparisons to the original 1996 “Twister.”
So, I went in expecting to enjoy it from the first perspective. I was curious about how “bad” it would be from the second perspective, but not in a cynical way. I just went in with the expectation that it wouldn’t be a “serious” look at chasing.
Overall, I enjoyed the movie very much - it was a summer blockbuster *and* was about chasing, what’s not to like?!? But it was also somewhat unsatisfying, sort of analogous to having just gorged myself on fast food.
Obviously there was no seriousness in the treatment of storm chasing and not much depth or complexity to the plot, so I’m not going to try to write like a film critic here… I’m just going to make some random observations, with an inevitable focus on the stuff that made no sense.
- The weather- and chasing-related *dialogue* wasn’t quite as ridiculous as I feared. Very early in the film, a character said something to the effect of, “The Doppler is not showing storms until later this afternoon.” I was like, oh boy, here we go… But that was actually probably the worst of it. The original Twister featured several word salads of technical terms used in completely non-sensical contexts and combinations. I didn’t really find that here, although maybe I will notice more if I watch it again. One other thing was the characterizing of tornados by EF rating before or without any damage indicators. The “tornado wrangler” actually explains in the movie that tornados can’t be rated until after the fact, which I thought was cool, yet he later proceeds to call out tornados by their supposed EF rating, even after having said that. (Of course, I’m not saying it was like an instructional video either!) There was a mention of the “suck zone” but I assume that was a self-parodying nod to the original.
- The unrealistic ridiculousness was obviously in the action itself: driving directly into tornados; shooting fireworks up into it; no other chasers ever on the road other than the two groups; everyone milling around while storms were already in progress; practically walking out of the house and seeing a tornado, etc.
- Unfathomable that two chasers would be at a rodeo totally unaware of an approaching tornado until it was upon them!
- The whole premise for the scientists trying to triangulate tornados with three radars was ridiculous - its already being done, that’s what the DOWs are for… Actually taking a step backward to have to get out of the truck to deploy them as standalone devices. Also, there was a comment about having to recover one before it ran out of power and the data would be lost - makes no sense that the data would have been stored locally on the device rather than transmitted. And even if it did reside on the device, why would a power loss affect it? Does your laptop hard drive or mobile phone lose all its files when it loses power??
- Several times it seemed that the chasers were commenting about a storm looking good in its development, in the way that we would typically comment relatively early on in the life of a supercell, except a tornado was clearly imminent (great CGI by the way, as others have said even before the movie was released). They seemed to fully react to a tornado only when it was fully condensed from cloud to ground, not when a funnel was clearly visible, not even if debris was visible beneath it. They were never in the scene for tornadogenesis, they were always driving toward it. I guess seeing chasers waiting around in a field wouldn’t be that interesting…
- That scene where Kate was photographing that good storm structure while with the “tornado wrangler” closer to the end of the film - were they even chasing at the time? Almost seemed like they were just casually watching something they happened to notice before they started chasing…
- I forget the “tornado wrangler” character’s name. Let’s just refer to him as “ RT.”
Yes, obvious parallels there, with a chase vehicle that anchors into the ground, shooting rockets up into storms, the social media emphasis, etc. Interesting twist that his crew was made to be the “good guys,” against the scientists backed by a businessman.
- Sex appeal of male and female leads is obviously part of movies like this. I thought the original‘s Helen Hunt had a much more mature attractiveness, and was a way better female lead. Daisy Edgar-Jones looks like a kid. Is that only because I am older now? I don’t think so; I just watched the original a week ago, and Helen Hunt still looks like a woman to me, while Daisy looks like a teenage girl. Big disparity in screen presence. Maybe they should have let Daisy keep her British accent Interesting that this time the “love triangle” was two men competing for a woman, whereas in the original it was two women competing for a man.
- I thought it was kind of neat when RT commented to Kate’s mother about the uncertain decisions and role of intuition in chasing. And also a comment that her friend from the science team said about it being “part of the game” to botch an intercept. Oh how I wish there could someday be a movie about chasing that really gets into that whole human side of chasing - the decision-making, self-doubt, etc.
- I didn’t understand why Kate’s friend soured on her - he said something to the effect of “there was a time I would do anything for you Kate, but not anymore.” This was after the argument they had had at the disaster scene, but he was the one who had said something out of line and he knew it…
- I assume the choice of El Reno for the climactic tornado was intended as a tribute to the TWISTEX team and infamous 2013 tornado?
- I liked the little nods to the original, like Dorothy, the little silver instrument balls, the digital image of the released packets swirling up in the tornado like at the end of Twister when Dorothy was deployed, and the reference to the “suck zone.”
- There was actually more depth and complexity to the lead characters I think. In the original, Helen Hunt’s character’s backstory was the loss of her parents in a tornado when she was a child. In this one, Kate had some direct responsibility for the death of her friends in a field experiment. Bill Paxton’s character’s situation was simply his pending divorce from the Helen Hunt character and ultimately being torn between two women and two lifestyles. In Twisters, I liked RT’s admission of the role of fear.
Well, I guess that’s it for now. I’m sure I’ll think of more later, and will have some stuff to comment on when I read others’ posts, but I have to get to work now, I am an hour behind schedule!
Saw it with the whole family yesterday, Sunday afternoon, at a 3:50pm IMAX show. Avoided reading any of the reviews here so that I could go in without any prejudices or spoilers. Still haven’t read any of the posts here so that I could write about first impressions without any other influences - so apologies in advance if any of this is redundant with earlier posts.
After sitting through endless previews in the theater, it was a pretty cool feeling when the lights were turned down and the first images and sounds of “Twisters” finally appeared. After all the speculation and 28 (!) years since the original, Twisters was about to begin!!!
There is an inherent and unavoidable duality for us in a movie like this. On one side of the coin: What could be better than a movie about storm chasing?!? Despite our perceptions of how many more people are doing it, or how much more familiar it has become to the mainstream public, fact is storm chasing is a tiny niche interest relative to the size of the US population, let alone the world. To see a major motion picture based on it, to immerse yourself in a fictional chasing world for two hours, is simply fantastic. On the other side of the coin, we are doomed to view the movie through the lens of actual storm chasers with knowledge of severe weather. While every viewer has to suspend disbelief, we have to take it to another level to avoid parsing every word of dialogue. While the general audience knows certain things are exaggerated and just sits there happily and obliviously enjoying it, we tend to get irritated by those same scenes.
Also, one thing both chasers and non-chasers would share would be the tendency to make comparisons to the original 1996 “Twister.”
So, I went in expecting to enjoy it from the first perspective. I was curious about how “bad” it would be from the second perspective, but not in a cynical way. I just went in with the expectation that it wouldn’t be a “serious” look at chasing.
Overall, I enjoyed the movie very much - it was a summer blockbuster *and* was about chasing, what’s not to like?!? But it was also somewhat unsatisfying, sort of analogous to having just gorged myself on fast food.
Obviously there was no seriousness in the treatment of storm chasing and not much depth or complexity to the plot, so I’m not going to try to write like a film critic here… I’m just going to make some random observations, with an inevitable focus on the stuff that made no sense.
- The weather- and chasing-related *dialogue* wasn’t quite as ridiculous as I feared. Very early in the film, a character said something to the effect of, “The Doppler is not showing storms until later this afternoon.” I was like, oh boy, here we go… But that was actually probably the worst of it. The original Twister featured several word salads of technical terms used in completely non-sensical contexts and combinations. I didn’t really find that here, although maybe I will notice more if I watch it again. One other thing was the characterizing of tornados by EF rating before or without any damage indicators. The “tornado wrangler” actually explains in the movie that tornados can’t be rated until after the fact, which I thought was cool, yet he later proceeds to call out tornados by their supposed EF rating, even after having said that. (Of course, I’m not saying it was like an instructional video either!) There was a mention of the “suck zone” but I assume that was a self-parodying nod to the original.
- The unrealistic ridiculousness was obviously in the action itself: driving directly into tornados; shooting fireworks up into it; no other chasers ever on the road other than the two groups; everyone milling around while storms were already in progress; practically walking out of the house and seeing a tornado, etc.
- Unfathomable that two chasers would be at a rodeo totally unaware of an approaching tornado until it was upon them!
- The whole premise for the scientists trying to triangulate tornados with three radars was ridiculous - its already being done, that’s what the DOWs are for… Actually taking a step backward to have to get out of the truck to deploy them as standalone devices. Also, there was a comment about having to recover one before it ran out of power and the data would be lost - makes no sense that the data would have been stored locally on the device rather than transmitted. And even if it did reside on the device, why would a power loss affect it? Does your laptop hard drive or mobile phone lose all its files when it loses power??
- Several times it seemed that the chasers were commenting about a storm looking good in its development, in the way that we would typically comment relatively early on in the life of a supercell, except a tornado was clearly imminent (great CGI by the way, as others have said even before the movie was released). They seemed to fully react to a tornado only when it was fully condensed from cloud to ground, not when a funnel was clearly visible, not even if debris was visible beneath it. They were never in the scene for tornadogenesis, they were always driving toward it. I guess seeing chasers waiting around in a field wouldn’t be that interesting…
- That scene where Kate was photographing that good storm structure while with the “tornado wrangler” closer to the end of the film - were they even chasing at the time? Almost seemed like they were just casually watching something they happened to notice before they started chasing…
- I forget the “tornado wrangler” character’s name. Let’s just refer to him as “ RT.”
Yes, obvious parallels there, with a chase vehicle that anchors into the ground, shooting rockets up into storms, the social media emphasis, etc. Interesting twist that his crew was made to be the “good guys,” against the scientists backed by a businessman.- Sex appeal of male and female leads is obviously part of movies like this. I thought the original‘s Helen Hunt had a much more mature attractiveness, and was a way better female lead. Daisy Edgar-Jones looks like a kid. Is that only because I am older now? I don’t think so; I just watched the original a week ago, and Helen Hunt still looks like a woman to me, while Daisy looks like a teenage girl. Big disparity in screen presence. Maybe they should have let Daisy keep her British accent
Interesting that this time the “love triangle” was two men competing for a woman, whereas in the original it was two women competing for a man.- I thought it was kind of neat when RT commented to Kate’s mother about the uncertain decisions and role of intuition in chasing. And also a comment that her friend from the science team said about it being “part of the game” to botch an intercept. Oh how I wish there could someday be a movie about chasing that really gets into that whole human side of chasing - the decision-making, self-doubt, etc.
- I didn’t understand why Kate’s friend soured on her - he said something to the effect of “there was a time I would do anything for you Kate, but not anymore.” This was after the argument they had had at the disaster scene, but he was the one who had said something out of line and he knew it…
- I assume the choice of El Reno for the climactic tornado was intended as a tribute to the TWISTEX team and infamous 2013 tornado?
- I liked the little nods to the original, like Dorothy, the little silver instrument balls, the digital image of the released packets swirling up in the tornado like at the end of Twister when Dorothy was deployed, and the reference to the “suck zone.”
- There was actually more depth and complexity to the lead characters I think. In the original, Helen Hunt’s character’s backstory was the loss of her parents in a tornado when she was a child. In this one, Kate had some direct responsibility for the death of her friends in a field experiment. Bill Paxton’s character’s situation was simply his pending divorce from the Helen Hunt character and ultimately being torn between two women and two lifestyles. In Twisters, I liked RT’s admission of the role of fear.
Well, I guess that’s it for now. I’m sure I’ll think of more later, and will have some stuff to comment on when I read others’ posts, but I have to get to work now, I am an hour behind schedule!
