As big-budget mainstream movies go, ‘Twisters’ has everything going for it. A disaster movie that goes bigger than its predecessor, it’s got two engaging leads – Daisy Edgar-Jones and Glen Powell – a terrifying natural disaster that lends well to cinema, the budget to make it all work, and a director who knows how to balance the tone so that it delivers just the right amount of cheese while still highlighting the very human element that is at the center of any cataclysm.
‘Twisters’ is about Kate Carter (Daisy Edgar-Jones), who suffers a terrible tragedy while doing research on how to decrease a tornado’s intensity. She’s portrayed as someone who is just naturally gifted with an instinct for the weather, but that tragedy has left her at a desk job in New York as a meteorologist. She’s asked to come back to her home state of Oklahoma when an old friend wants to continue the research with cutting edge technology. He needs her to help them find the tornados.
As she returns to Oklahoma, she finds herself in the middle of an unprecedented event: a tornado season that is sprouting twisters almost on a daily basis. Kate is surprised to see that the present day is filled with tornado-chasers, including the self-possessed media celebrity Tyler Owens, who chases after tornados and streams it live on the internet.
For Tyler, he’s smitten by her and later on, intrigued by her knowledge of the weather. But she’s pegged him as a clout chaser of the worst kind and has nothing to do with him. Their rivalry leads them to clash and then later bond. Revelations are revealed that forces Kate to face her tragic past while a major storm is about to happen that threatens to turn everything upside and inside out.
‘Twisters’ is fast-paced and sometimes in a rush to push characters forward without really taking its time to establish stronger motivations. It’s the rhythm and speed of a commercial film. It wants to get us straight into the action and watch the sparks fly between Kate and Tyler.
What’s great about Lee Isaac Chung’s direction (from a screenplay by Mark L. Smith) is that he never really highlights the blossoming romance between the two lead characters. It’s there but it’s not angling for center stage. Chung is more focused on Kate’s own complex emotions regarding the tornadoes while trying to deconstruct the idea of Tyler Owens’ own interest as a twister-chasing internet celebrity. For the most part, it’s Tyler who is actively chasing Kate, but she has demons to face.
And then, Chung and Smith also manage to bring us to the human side of things: the destruction that’s caused by such a meteorological event. It attempts to bring up the ugliness of capitalism in a predictable manner but doesn’t delve too much into it so as to tip the balance and keeps the film straight into the spectacle of the tornadoes themselves. While Powell and Edgar-Jones are remarkable, watching them work is a joy, but the true stars here are the CGI effects of the twisters and the action sequences that involve them.
The film treats these weather phenomena like Godzilla—they are monstrous and beautiful at the same time. The fascination these characters have with them become clear the moment you see it in your comfortable cinema seats. To watch them throw themselves at it, whether it’s for the likes or for research, the experience is quite enjoyable.
The climax is insane but the science that provides a solution is sketchy, at best (and with further reading on the internet, is quite improbable), but it looks great on screen. And while I’m not expecting a deep story from a movie about tornado-chasers, I am a little frustrated of Hollywood’s fascination of making professional scientists and PhD holders stuffy and boring while untrained professionals with a lot of experience are treated as fun and just as good. I’m not saying it’s not possible, but it adds to a class division that is trite and overused and quite dangerous in this era of anti-intellectualism.
But outside of that, it’s a fun ride. I don’t know if I’ll remember much after weeks have passed but Edgar-Jones and Powell are in my radar and very excited to see what they come up with next.
My Rating:
Twisters is now showing! Check showtimes and buy tickets here.
