Director: Lee Isaac Chung
Stars: Glen Powell, Daisy Edgar-Jones, Katy O' Brian, David Corenswet & Anthony Ramos
Runtime: 1 hour 57 mins
Genre: Action Adventure Thriller
Coming in at Number 3 on my most anticipated movies of the year, Twisters directed by Lee Isaac Chung (Minari) is a sequel of sorts, reportedly set in the same world as the 1996 original but following a completely new set of characters, set in present day.
I absolutely adored the original movie back in 1996, I literally obsessed over it. Together with Jurassic Park, three years earlier it became a seminal movie of my teen years. I saw it way too many times at the cinema, bought both the original score and music soundtrack (first and only time I have ever done that). It gave me a life long love of extreme weather, with tornadoes in particular. I read countless books on the history of famous tornadoes, together with books and videos on the science behind them.
Anyway let's not carried away, let's break it down.
Story and Plot
After a fateful encounter with a tornado, storm chaser Kate Cooper (Edgar-Jones) gets persuaded back to the open plains by Javi (Ramos) to pilot a ground breaking new system. Once on the trail she soon crosses path's with Tyler Owens (Powell), he's good looking, charming but reckless. As the storm intensifies, Kate, Tyler, Javi and their crews have to join forces in a fight for their lives as supercell storms converge over central Oklahoma.
My overall thoughts...
Back in the heady days of the mid to late 90's, CGI and VFX were revolutionising Hollywood. The industry took advantage of this with a proliferation of disaster movies such as Volcano, Dante's Peak, Deep Impact and Armageddon. But Twister (for me at least) was a cut above the rest.
The thrill of the original movie was the opportunity to see and experience photo realistic tornadoes in thrilling action set pieces, that literally blew audiences away. Twenty-eight years later VFX and CGI have advanced so much that this alone is no longer a draw for audiences.
So was I blown away with this remake?
Whilst for me it didn't compare to the original, in the fact that it lacked the punchy spine tingling action sequences of that movie, it is a damn fun action summer blockbuster with some nice nostalgic member berries (red RAM truck and some lines from the original). The movie should do well as counter programming to Deadpool & Wolverine released next week.
What I liked about the movie is it never tried to copy the original and very much wanted to stand on it's own two feet. What it does is essentially offer a twist (ok, I had to use that word) on the original story by placing Kate (Edgar Jones) (essentially this movie's Helen Hunt) with the geeks and the audience initially looks in from the outside on Owens (Powell) ragtag bag of misfits. Whereas the original movie told the story firmly from the misfits gangs point of view headed by Jo (Helen Hunt).
It works well as there is a nice twist (there's that word again) with the geeks crew that ultimately leads Kate to question which side she should be on.
Cast
Glen Powell steals the show as the hunky cowboy scientist Tyler Owens. His presence is fun, disarming and as the movie wears on you get to see another side to his character that makes you warm to him more and more, and whilst the character of Kate is in a sense an amalgamation of Bill and Jo from the original movie, Tyler is a fresh injection into the franchise.
As for British born Daisy-Edgar Jones this was my first movie of hers. Her character Kate is clearly brilliant and has a natural instinct for sniffing out on-coming storms. She is clearly an excellent actress and whilst her story is heartfelt and very well acted, her signature low-key quality can make the proceedings more serious than they need to be.
Anthony Ramos does his usual sturdy job in support as Javi, Kate's friend who also suffers loss in the movie.
Twisters as well has a decent stab of banding together the loveable roguish bunch of misfits that make up Tyler's crew. As the movie is set in the present day, the group led by Owens are a YouTube sensation rather than a band of unknowns as in the original. Whilst never reaching the heights of the original gang, which included such actors as Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Alan Ruck, they are a loveable group all the same.
Katy O'Brian coming off Love Lives Bleeding is the lead actress in the group. Brandon Perea as Boone Owen's right-hand man is good but does little else other than holler and scream throughout most of the movie, "Twins, we've got twins!!" as featured in the trailer.
One bizarre choice though was to include Ben a British photo journalist played by Harry Hadden-Paton who documents the groups exploits, it just felt out of place and he was there mainly for the comic relief.
David Corenswet, (cast as Superman in next year’s James Gunn led movie) heads up the rival gang of geeks. He didn't have a huge amount to do, but you can see from his sheer presence and physicality that Gunn has chosen well for the Man of Steel.
On screen Action
Whilst the set-pieces in Twisters lack the sheer spine tingling impact of the original they are very well done and are really enjoyable.
Whilst Jan De Bont decided in Twister to progressively rachet up the ante with each tornado getting larger than the last (literally F2 to F5). Chung takes a slightly different approach by throwing in a more eclectic mix of tornadoes. This made the action slightly less punchy and focused than the 96' original.
Whilst the action is exciting, Chung wanted to make the science of the tornadoes as accurate as possible. He therefore used Kevin Kelleher, science advisor to not only this movie but the 1996 original.
Cinematography & Effects
As with Twister, VFX & CGI plays a huge part in this new movie. Along with VFX Chung was adamant that the cast got deluged (literally) with in-camera effects. Wind and rain machines with real flying debris was used to bring the storms to life. This is nothing new, Helen Hunt and Bill Paxton were nearly blinded by debris on the set of the original movie.
As for the CGI and VFX, Industrial Light and Magic (ILM) were employed to take the reigns once more after their ground-breaking work on the 1996 film. Chung's biggest fear going in for this movie was that he was more than aware that today's audiences take for granted VFX and CGI. Add to the fact YouTube is awash with real footage of tornadoes. So he decided the logical step would be to immerse audiences in the tornado itself.
I'm happy to report that ILM have excelled themselves with Twisters, the CGI and VFX are cutting edge and definitely represent that next step in the creation of extreme weather on screen.
This movie needs to be seen on the biggest screen possible, it's also a rare blockbuster that is filmed on 35mm filmstock not digital and you can really tell.
Music, Score & Sound
Benjamin Wallfisch (Blade Runner 2049, It and Shazam!) takes over composing duties from Mark Mancina who created (in my book) one of the best movie scores of all time with Twister. The iconic score played a huge part in why that movie became so beloved by me.
With Twisters, however I am very sorry to say I found Wallfisch's score all most non existent in the movie. Rather than featuring a rousing and memorable score as in the 96 original, the movie chooses to put a much greater emphasis on a wealth of originally written songs for the movie such as "Ain't No Love in Oklahoma" by Luke Combs, "Never Left Me" by Megan Moroney and "Hell or High Water" by Bailey Zimmerman. It’s needle drop city.
The sound design in the movie supplied by non other than Skywalker Sound is universally excellent.
Whilst never quite reaching the heights of the iconic 1996 original, Twisters is a damn fun summer blockbuster that did not disappoint. The action set-pieces whilst less impactful than Twister are very well done with top notch CGI & VFX courtesy of ILM. It has a solid cast with Powell proving to be the movie's MVP, all this and no flying cows!
Verdict - Unexpected Surprise
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