Twister, the Movie, Not the Game

I have watched and enjoyed this movie numerous times. I didn’t see it in a theatre, where it could really zonk you with special effects. On the other hand, the requisite noise would likely have been obnoxious.

The movie offers a lot of homely virtues along with the effects. The plot —I forgot that Michael Crichton co-wrote the movie—follows a standard Hollywood map of romantic tension, virtueless bad guy, and final success. All occurs crisply. 

Helen Hunt leads the cast. She’s comfortably quirky. She keeps the drama subdued. Her team of storm hunters all look familiar from tv and film, tho you may not know their names. Each one bears a very definite stamp, an abundance of nerds. They were made to interact humourously without too much pressure. Philip Seymour Hoffman occupies his own continent of quirk. He wasn’t famous when the movie came out, and I haven’t seen any of his starring roles, but he sure puts energy into a small role of largely comic relief.

A surprising point of engagement with Twister resides in the sense of landscape displayed. The cornfields and wide spaces look so grand and inviting. It is Oklahoma in the summer, so hot and humid likely apply as apt descriptors of the climate but I want to be there. Granted, none of the characters appear to sweat. Still, one feels the enchantment—I will use that word—of sun and breeze and the living land.

When twisters finally show up, electricity passes thru the nerves. The fx looks real enough for me. Of course I would love to see a tornado, tho not in a risky way, and I don’t wish to see the destruction.

The movie rushes to its denouement. The blur of stunts as the F5 closes in is impressive if unlikely (the lucky near misses, the pickup driving completely thru a house). At one point the two twister experts decide to escape the tornado by entering a barn. Really? That at least affords a joke because the barn is full of cutting instruments, suggesting that some corn fed Jason Voorhees lives there. But all is well, science lives, and romance returns. Cue Van Hagar and the credits.

Note: I looked up director Jan de Bont's filmography. He was first a cinematographer. Twister shows a good visual eye. His directorial debut was Speed, a commercial and critical success. I never saw it, peccavi.

Twister did boffo at the box office but earned a Golden Razzie for poor direction. The movie looks good, Helen Hunt is strong, the rest of the cast is competent: I don't see the issue. De Bont got several more Razzies for movies I never saw. He kept working but his career seems to have fizzled.