Aren\u2019t movies of this summer spinning delightfully vintage vibes? Just collectively consider \u201cMad Max\u201d offshoot \u201cFuriosa:\u00a0A Mad Max Saga,\u201d seeing Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills again through \u201cBeverly Hills Cop:\u00a0Axel F,\u201d Kevin Costner\u2019s shrewdly old-school Western \u201cHorizon:\u00a0An American Saga – Chapter 1,\u201d the classical inspirational appeal of \u201cYoung Woman and The Sea,\u201d the screwball-adjacent magnetism of \u201cHit Man\u201d and you\u2019ll get the flavor.<\/p>\n
Lifted up significantly by Glen Powell\u2019s unique charms like that last title\u2014pick any combination of a lovable geek, a handsome heartthrob, a dependable boy-next-door\u2014Lee Isaac Chung\u2019s thunderous legacy-sequel \u201cTwisters\u201d is joining the nostalgic lot this week, as a follow-up to 1996\u2019s sensational Jan de Bont-directed original, \u201cTwister.\u201d And despite some miscalculations that weigh this installment of fearless tornado chasers down, \u201cTwisters\u201d is an enthralling summer blockbuster on the whole, thanks in large part to Powell\u2019s presence, which is fun, disarming, and even cheekily silly.<\/p>\n
But before we meet Powell\u2019s self-professed cowboy scientist Tyler, we follow Daisy Edgar-Jones\u2019 Kate, a bright, aspiring scientist from Oklahoma, who\u2019s both mesmerized by the beauty of twisters and seeking ways to tame their destructive power. The opening sequence\u2014like De Bont\u2019s escapade\u2014is genuinely impressive and heartbreaking, recounting a miscalculated case of tornado chasing led by Kate that claimed the lives of two of her closest friends. Among the clan\u2014but watching from afar\u2014is Javi (the stellar Anthony Ramos of \u201cIn the Heights\u201d), a fellow storm enthusiast clearly infatuated by the doe-eyed Kate.<\/p>\n
Cut to five years after that catastrophe, when circumstances unite Javi and Kate again in their hometown, with Kate now being a scarred, New York-based scientist, and Javi, a well-meaning entrepreneur, working for a morally dubious real estate venture. On the other side of the storm tracks are Tyler and his ragtag team of YouTube-famous, do-gooding tornado wranglers played by the likes of Katy O\u2019Brian, Sasha Lane, Tunde Adebi and Brandon Perea, whisking a droll British journalist (Harry Hadden-Paton) into the heart of the storm for a story. \u201cCity Girl\u201d Kate and Stetson-wearing dog-rescuer Tyler meet cute through all that and exchange some customary snark, but slowly fall for each other\u2019s charms and complementary skills in due course.<\/p>\n
If \u201cTwisters\u201d has a major misstep, it takes that with the casting of Edgar-Jones, a graceful actor of restrained mannerisms and quiet allure that were in sync with the brooding notes of \u201cNormal People\u201d and \u201cWhere the Crawdads Sing,\u201d and added something to the survivor story of the horror-satire, \u201cFresh.\u201d But here, Edgar-Jones\u2019 signature lowkey quality almost drain \u201cTwisters\u201d of all its energy, making one miss a substantial presence like Helen Hunt in the lead, someone with a sturdy bite and fierce charisma. But Powell\u2019s movie-star dynamism thankfully proves to be captivating enough to carry the film, along with its impressive special effects and truly exciting set-pieces, one of which sends a crowded group of vulnerable townsfolk into a movie theater. It\u2019s as meta a sequence as seeing a flying cow, when the tornado sucks the cinema screen away and places the terrified sanctuary seekers in front of a flesh-and-blood storm roaring where the curtain used to be, while we take in the gloriously frightening scenery on our own screens. (This was one moment worthy of IMAX.) Whether or not it was the intention of Chung (and scribe Mark L. Smith, working from a story \u201cTop Gun: Maverick\u201d director Joseph Kosinski\u201d), the scene openly telegraphs that some sights ought to be seen in movie theaters, and movie theaters alone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Aren\u2019t movies of this summer spinning delightfully vintage vibes? Just collectively consider \u201cMad Max\u201d offshoot \u201cFuriosa:\u00a0A Mad Max Saga,\u201d seeing Eddie Murphy in Beverly Hills again through \u201cBeverly Hills Cop:\u00a0Axel F,\u201d Kevin Costner\u2019s shrewdly old-school Western \u201cHorizon:\u00a0An American Saga – Chapter 1,\u201d the classical inspirational appeal of \u201cYoung Woman and The Sea,\u201d the screwball-adjacent magnetism …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30],"tags":[36,35,37],"class_list":["post-1436","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-thriller-movies","tag-action","tag-adventure","tag-thriller"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1436","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1436"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1436\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1436"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1436"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/us.celebrity2000.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1436"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}