★★★★★
If there’s one movie you see this summer, make it Twisters! Twisters is simply just a damn good time at the movies; it’s the perfect summer blockbuster! A movie with a little bit of everything. It’s scary, thrilling, funny, entertaining, and even life-affirming. The sequel no one saw coming delivers pure, unadulterated summertime escapist fare.
A stand-alone sequel to the second-biggest summer blockbuster of 1996, Lee Isaac Chung’s Twisters might belong to a different millennium than Jan de Bont’s original, and it only shares a single character with that cow-flying classic of early Hollywood CGI (a data machine named Dorothy), but each of these spectacles is swept along by the same creative ethos. To quote a character who’s racing to save as many civilians as he can from the massive tornado that rips through an Oklahoma town during the climax of Chung’s film: “We’ve gotta get everyone into the movie theater!”
Much like its predecessor, this rousing and surprisingly romantic gust of multiplex fun spins a strange combination of genres into a conventionally satisfying ride. Where Twister spun a vintage screwball comedy into the shape of a cutting-edge disaster movie, Twisters effectively flips that script by launching a (very) breezy modern rom-com into the vortex of an old-school Amblin adventure. This is the rare kind of legacy sequel that genuinely understands why the original worked in the first place and captures that same sensation again. It also manages to avoid shoehorning in all the tropes that tend to come with franchise reboots, and very much feels like its own movie! It’s the kind of sequel I yearn for; a bigger, better movie with neat effects, an engaging story, and a star-studded cast that can do no wrong.
A favorite thing about the 96 original? How the entire storm-chasing cast is memorable. The same is true here too. The ensemble is loaded with aces, including Daisy Edgar-Jones who makes a stellar anchor for the film. Anthony Ramos and Brandon Perea are really fantastic as well, but it is Glen Powell who truly steals the film with loads of charisma and charm! If you haven’t been convinced already, he really is that guy! Every second he’s on screen is a treat and he oozes star power. His chemistry with Edgar-Jones is also wonderful and together they serve as a wonderful replacement for the Bill Paxton/Helen Hunt dynamic of the original!
Lee Isaac Chung somehow made a 90’s disaster movie for the modern era. He infuses a lot of Spielbergian heart and emotional character work into the high-stakes set pieces and spectacle, nailing one gripping setpiece after the next – the entire third act is especially spectacular – balancing it with so many great character beats to make you invested within the chaos of the tornadoes. I never thought we’d get another Twister movie, let alone one this good. Super charming and exhilarating from top to bottom. Twisters has no business being as good as it is. I’m gonna say it - it’s better than the first film. The soundtrack, sound design, and visual and special effects are on point and I loved the choice to shoot on 35mm film. It heavily contributes to giving the film a grounded quality and making the action much more visceral. Lee Isaac Chung’s direction is impressive, handling the breathtakingly tense set pieces perfectly. The film is big, bold, tense, and thrilling, with an engaging story and a cast that can do no wrong – the perfect summer blockbuster!
The pure blockbuster filmmaking magic that is Twisters. This is why we go to the movies… to see Glen Powell in a wet t-shirt wrangle some fucking tornadoes. This is cinema. It brought me back to the days of the adrenaline-fueled, unapologetically over-the-top motion pictures that made me fall in love with film. This was something wildly entertaining. Just good, old-fashioned, fun. Non-stop awesome. This was special to me and I really liked it. Quite possibly the BEST movie theatre experience one could have since Top Gun: Maverick!
If you’ll excuse the pun: Twisters will blow you away! (especially in IMAX or 4DX)
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