It’s the wonder of nature, baby!
Twisters, which was released in theatres Friday, is a “spiritual sequel” to the 1996 cult classic film that starred Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt. As a spiritual sequel, it does not directly follow the events from the first film, although there are certainly callbacks to it and the film has the same spirit as the first.
As with the first film, much of the action takes place in the heart of Tornado Valley (the area in the central part of the U.S. where most tornadoes strike) in Oklahoma. The film follows Kate Carter (Daisy Edgar-Jones) whose character easily could have been the daughter of Paxton and Hunt’s characters, Bill and Jo Harding. Kate has traits of both original characters and acts as the perfect combination of the two.
Like her predecessors, Kate is obsessed with tornadoes and learning more about them. She has come up with an idea to reduce the intensity of tornadoes using sodium polyacrylate and in the film’s prologue, attempts to launch her idea into the sky. However, things turn south when the twister grows into an EF5 tornado, the strongest of all tornadoes.
The rest of the film’s action takes place five years later. Kate has since moved to New York to work for NOAA (The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration). Kate’s friend Javi (Anthony Ramos), who was the only survivor of the prologue besides Kate, works for a company called Storm Par, which is seeking to test a new tornado scanning system. Javi persuades Kate to come home by showing her destruction from a recent tornado.
When they arrive in Oklahoma, they cross paths with a YouTube storm chaser named Tyler Owens (Glen Powell) who calls himself the “Tornado Wrangler.” Tyler could be thought of as a more extreme version of Phillip Seymour Hoffman’s Dusty from the original film. Tyler is obsessed with tornadoes and loves to get up close and personal with them, even driving directly into a tornado’s path to get content for his YouTube channel.
Much of the movie is spent chasing tornadoes, with Kate joining forces with Tyler after they survive a nighttime tornado at a rodeo reminiscent of the infamous drive-in tornado featured in the first film.
While the film does not directly reference the first film and no characters from the first film appear or are mentioned, there are several Easter eggs contained within the film. These include Kate being dressed identically to Helen Hunt’s Jo for about a third of the film (dressed in a white tank top with khaki pants), Kate repeating Bill Paxton’s line “I’m not back” and even Paxton’s character’s invention Dorothy (“an instrument pack for studying tornadoes” as it’s called in the first movie) appearing during the prologue.
Even with the film being a sequel in name only, it stands strong on its own. The characters are compelling and well-rounded. Everyone serves a purpose in the story, no matter how big or small their role. The imagery of the film works well and does a wonderful job showing the scenery of Oklahoma and the intensity of tornadoes.
One mild critique is the portrayal of Midwesterners being seemingly unprepared for tornadoes. In the film, many of them seemed taken by surprise whenever a twister hits, dramatically running to take cover at the last minute. In reality, most Midwesterners are at least aware of the potential of a twister and will take shelter long before the twister strikes. Of course, the last second panicking is done for dramatic effect, and it works well to show the chaos that often accompanies a severe storm.
Twisters is playing only in theaters.
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