Lee Isaac Chung’s Twisters

It is time to twist again, like we did in 1996. Seriously, how could they pass up licensing Chubby Checker for this soundtrack? Sure, the new film is set in Oklahoma, so the country music makes sense, but still. They also could have been more conceptual and included some Weather Report tunes from the Heavy Weather album. Regardless, the Sooner State is definitely in store for some heavy weather in Lee Isaac Chung’s sort-of-not-really sequel Twisters, which opens Friday on almost every movie screen in America.

For a movie like this, viewers should be trained not to emotionally invest too heavily in the characters that appear in the prologue. Kate Carter survives, but she retires from storm-chasing to monitor weather patterns on computer screens, due to her paralyzing guilt and PTSD. Yet, Carter was clearly meant for field work, because she has an almost intuitive sense of how storms will behave.

Needing her “tornado whisperer” skills, her old [still living] research teammate Javi convinces her to join him for a week of storm-chasing. He claims the tech developed by his new start-up, Storm-Par, will help the people of Tornado Alley. Carter is a little rusty, but she quickly regains her storm-footing, out-navigating Storm Par’s rivals, a group of YouTube influencers led by Tyler Owens, a former bull-rider turned meteorology student-turned internet show-boater.

Owens’ temperament and style immediately rub Carter the wrong way, but he keeps trying to charm her anyway. Clearly, Javi’s financial backer, a bottom-feeding real estate developer is the real sleaze, but it will take a fair amount of time arguing with Owens before she realizes it. Of course, if she decides to dust-off her old Tornado-suppressing experiments, a swaggering storm-chaser like Owens might be just the kind of cat who is crazy enough to help her.

As was true for the previous film, the big swirling storms are the main attraction. They are bigger than ever, thanks to advances in special effects technology rather than any kind of climate-related trends. Yes, it is true: nobody mentions climate change, but viewers can sometimes infer it being implied. Regardless, the film’s reluctance to lecture the audience from its soapbox is appreciated.

Indeed, it is one of the ways that Chung, formerly an awards and arthouse darling for Minari, proved to be such a good match for this material. Throughout Twisters (with an “s”) you will not find any jokes about gun-racks in pick-ups or John Deere ball-caps. Chung knows rural America, because that is where his family settled, just like in the semi-autobiographical Minari, so he understands and sympathizes with those who still live there. Plus, as a former Arkansas resident, Chung might have more real-world research to draw from than he might have preferred at the time. Regardless, that sensitivity really adds a lot.

Glen Powell is also unusually attuned to Middle American sensibilities, which is the major reason why he is well on his way to being the next Tom Cruise. Indeed, he is downright Cruisian as cocky but big-hearted Owens. Daisy Edgar-Jones lacks his pop-off-the-screen charisma, but she still develops decent charisma with him as angsty Carter. Anthony Ramos brings some complexity to the compromised Javi (whose military backstory is mentioned in passing and then immediately forgotten), while Maura Tierney is appealingly tough and earthy as Carter’s mom, Cathy.

The storms are great and the interpersonal drama is at least a cut above that in the 1996 film. There are almost no apostolic links, aside from executive producer Steven Spielberg, but Bill Paxton’s son James makes a brief appearance as “Cody.” Oklahoma also plays itself again, which certainly contributes to the authenticity. Watching a funnel cloud form along the lonely horizon is no joke there. Recommended as a studio tent-pole that delivers what it promises, without forgetting the human element, Twisters opens this Friday (7/19) in theaters.