Twisters (2024) **** – Seen at the Cinema

Now we’re talking. The summer blockbuster has arrived. The high octane movie bringing more carnage and destruction than two teams of superheroes duking it out thanks to stunning special effects that will have you gasping at the awesome power of a tornado. Forget the flying cow in the 1996 original. When you see how easily a tornado sucks out people hidden in the tightest spot then you’ll know how foolish it is to tangle with twisters, either for the hell of it or for purported scientific reasons.

On top of this and if it hadn’t been for those tornadoes racing around all over the place, we’d be watching the cutest romance this side of Anyone But You (2023) and blow me down if this doesn’t feature the fella from that, Glen Powell, in full-on cocky arrogant mode and the kind of shit-eating smile we haven’t seen since Josh Lucas in his prime.

But here’s the kicker: no matter how much Powell’s character nearly steals the show, it’s not his picture.

Daisy Edgar-Jones (When the Crawdads Sing, 2022) is not only billed ahead of him, and therefore the denoted star, but the movie follows her narrative arc. She’s in the stunning opening sequence and she’s the one – on her own – to tackle the killer twister at the end. She’s the one with the guilt – friends died following one of her plans – she can’t shift, not him. He merely tucks in alongside as she leads the way, gently, and initially rebuffed at every turn, trying to woo her.

And here’s another kicker. It’s sodden with science. The kind of information that has audiences looking for the exit. But the scientific psychobabble is delivered so well that you hardly have a moment to object and I’m sure if you held a pop quiz for moviegoers coming out I’m sure they’d be able to tell you exactly how twisters formed and what they needed to not only survive but grow.

The save-the-planet element is miniscule, hardly gets a breath, the idea that climate change is causing more twisters. And instead, we get a more cunning subplot, entrepreneur financing tornado research because he can move in on survivors and snap up land on the cheap. And if that’s not a poke at the greedy big business coming under fire for unwelcome philanthropy, I don’t know what is.

So Kate (Daisy Edgar-Jones) is out of the game after causing the death of friends and lover until former buddy Javi (Anthony Ramos) winkles her out of her safe New York job to help him better test her pet theory – that there’s a way to tame twisters. Sure, that’s malarkey but it’s interesting malarkey. So she gives him a week and pitches in with his team, financed to the hilt by a businessmen to whom they feed tips about where the next twister will land.

She’s immediately put in charge of twister detection, demonstrating her instinctive knowledge of where a tornado might head or which cloud formation is most likely to turn nasty. These are the PhD po-faced professionals, all working, apparently, for the benefit of mankind.

Into their world charges Tyler (Glen Powell), YouTube broadcaster with a million subscribers, dressed like a cowboy who has his own line in merchandise and chases after twisters like Lt Killgore (Robert Duvall) in Apocalypse Now (1979), music blasting, though rock rather than classical. For entertainment value, he’s got on board weedy English journalist Ben (Harry Haden-Paton) whose job is to look terrified when the seasoned pros head into harm’s way with little concern. As I mentioned, mostly Tyler gets rebuffed when he tries his equally seasoned moves on Kate until her mum (Maura Tierney) comes to the rescue in a sequence that allows him to become better acquainted with her revolutionary tornado-taming theory.  

There’s a heck of a lot of the will-she-won’t-she palaver that you could get in a genuine rom-com but it’s very gently done and it’s more old-fashioned than Anyone but You, more like Sleepless in Seattle (1993) where kindred spirits take a heck of a long time to decide they might be suited. Mostly the business of chasing after those darned tornadoes keeps them apart, beyond the initial dislike that’s par for the course, and luckily the screenwriters haven’t tried to shoehorn in a scene of them having to snuggle up together in the middle of nowhere after a tornado’s blown the world apart.

The stars exude screen chemistry and if the question after Anyone but You was when were the two principals there going to make another film together the question here will be just the same. Daisy Edgar Jones is a dead ringer for a young Helen Mirren, the same innoent intensity, and brings the kind of acting skills to a blockbuster that sets it apart while Powell shines once again with studios already acclaiming him the next new big male star.

Shout-out for Anthony Ramos (In the Heights, 2021) and Downton Abbey find Harry Hadden-Paton who looks like he’s set for a career’s worth of interesting character acting.

Director Lee Isaac Chung (Minari, 2020) takes the leap from arthouse to blockbuster in his stride, that previous background helping flesh out characters, and he lands this behemoth in style. Screenplay by Mark L. Smith (The Boys in the Boat, 2023).  

My only disappointment is that I didn’t catch this in Imax. But that will be rectified soon.

Go see.