Mutant Reviewers from Hell do
“We’ve got cows!”

1996 PG13 / Action Adventure Directed by: Jan de Bont Starring: Helen Hunt, Bill Paxton, Cary Elwes, Philip Seymour Hoffman

Tagline

The Dark Side of Nature.

Summary Capsule

For the purported good of mankind, a group of intrepid adrenaline junkies masquerading as scientists chase around tornado alley in search of the ultimate “Suck Zone”.

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DVD | Soundtrack (Various Artists) | Soundtrack (Score)

Sue's Rating: I have a basement. It is a good basement.
Sue's Review: I’m not a superstitious person by any stretch of the imagination. I don’t worry about the trajectory of black cats, throw salt over my shoulder or obsess about cracks in the sidewalk. (The DOG broke my Mom’s back, okay?) So it’s purely coincidental that I decided to review Twister at the time of year least likely to produce tornadoes in my general vicinity. Blizzard, yes. Tornado, no.

"These people are absolute tornado magnets. Personally, after the first few touch downs, I’d have had every small town sheriff alerted to shoot them on sight in the interest of public safety."

Just to get the inevitable personal history out of the way, I’ll tell you up front that I’ve experienced three tornado-ish events in my lifetime. Two here in the lovely Midwest, and one, rather improbably, in the suburban Philadelphia area. Of course, there are at least four or five times a year that the offspring and I are obliged to scramble for the basement when the sirens go off and the television does the red screen fandango, but of the bona fide, didn’t-we-used-to-have-a-few-trees-here experiences… Three. And so, as a public service to you, the reader, here are five tornado tips gleaned from the experiences of yours truly:

1. Sitting by a plate glass window watching lawn furniture and tumbleweeded shrubbery fly by is an invitation for a visit by the committee for natural selection.

2. Golf ball sized hailstones really really really hurt. Don’t stick your head out the door when you see them. (But your friends can use them in a handy ice pack if you do.)

3. Howling green sludge right outside the window means that you should NOT be currently looking out that freakin’ window! You moron.

4. An oncoming tornado sounds very similar to an oncoming train. Unless you have a railroad in your backyard, consider this noise as a Very Bad Thing.

5. This is important! If my ex-husband ever tells you that a tornado in your location is absolutely impossible due to geographical or meteorological or even astrological conditions — RUN!

So yeah, we do take our ‘naders seriously around these parts, and no, I’m not referring to Ralph.

I could get all philosophical with you and launch into a lecture about how this movie plays on man’s visceral fear of nature’s wrath while also speaking to the innate desire to proactively face said fear in the ultimate search to tame and conquer the elements themselves. But why would I want to do something stupid like that?

Twister is a carnival ride — y’know those two-bit carnivals where the question isn’t so much how long is the ride going to be, but is this Tilt-a-Whirl going to disintegrate into a heap of twisted metal before I can get the heck off of it? Like that.

Bill Paxton (as… uhm… Bill) and Helen Hunt (Jo) play the leaders of a team trying to establish a boffo database about the inner workings of your typical tornado in an attempt to improve early warning systems. Okay, Bill isn’t really a leader anymore, because he divorced Jo and wants to marry a sex therapist named Melissa, but he’s there and the tornadoes are coming and… oh well, y’know how it is. Anyway, their idea is to send a gazillion little probe thingys up into the vortex and collect the ensuing data. The problem is that tornadoes (much like cats) aren’t inclined to stand there quietly and gulp down the nice little pills, as it were. But hey, no problem. All they have to do is find a tornado, put the container of probes in its path, and voila!

First, catch your tornado… heh. Granted it doesn’t seem likely, but in the cause of cinematic license, these people are absolute tornado magnets. Personally, after the first few touch downs, I’d have had every small town sheriff alerted to shoot them on sight in the interest of public safety.

Anyway, as anyone with an intellect above your basic unit of protoplasm has figured out by now, the down side of getting the probes into the tornado is that someone actually has to drive directly into its path in order to put the container into position. This, in my experience, is the last place any sane person with a yen for ongoing clean underwear wants to be. And yet, that is the story. Jo’s issues, Bill’s lovelife and Aunt Meg’s missing but yummy cows are merely incidental to the ballistic launching of farm equipment, random livestock and tanker trucks. Action packed is not an understatement here.

This is a fun movie — exciting and intense, but with enough wit and self-deprecation to move it several notches above your traditional doom and gloom apocalyptic stories. And Cary Elwes makes a pretty nifty sneering protagonist too. So when the clouds are black and the thunder is rumbling in the distance, grab a friend, nuke some popcorn and treat yourselves to a few hours of total paranoia. Just leave yourselves a clear path to the basement stairs. Okay?

"Tomorrow's forcast calls for sunny skies and dead tornado chasers" "No! I will not go to your Princess Bride party!" I wanna be the guy on the set who gets to aim the hose

Didja Notice? [some sources: IMDb]

• If the beginning of this movie doesn’t grab your attention, check your pulse and make sure you still have one.
• At the very beginning, Jo (as a little girl) leaves her doll in her bed when the family runs from the house, but she’s seen clutching the same doll in the storm cellar moments later.
• A cameo by The Shining
• How wonderfully ominous the background music is in this film?
• When Jo tells the team to collect aluminum soda cans, they all turn out to be Pepsi. Can you say product placement?
• The truck’s windshield has a whopping big hole knocked into it in one scene, but it’s only a little cracked in the next.
• The dogs and horses did pretty well for themselves throughout the movie. The cows, eh, not so much.
• Hail dents on close-ups of the pickup truck are not dissimilar to the ones on Sue’s car.

Is It Worth Staying Through End Credits?

Only if you find bucolic, yet slightly ominous, pastoral scenes of Iowa and Oklahoma endlessly fascinating.

Unnecessary Background

Although the movie constantly refers to oncoming or projected tornadoes by their number on the Fujita Scale (1-5), the scale actually measures the damage the tornado has left behind it.

Intermission! [some sources: IMDb]

Twister was the first movie ever to be released on DVD.

Joss Whedon of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel fame did an uncredited rewrite of the script.

A recording of a camel's moan was slowed down and used as the sound of the tornado.

The production team used a Boeing 707’s engine and giant fans for realistic wind conditions. They also pelted Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt’s truck with debris blown out of the backs of tractor-trailers and later blasted Paxton with man-made ice chips during a hail scene. Bet someone needed a generous application of Bactine when they wrapped that one up.

Groovy Quotes

Rabbit: (Brandishing a map) Kansas is a mess. There’s a big crease through Wichita!

Dusty: The Suck Zone. It’s the point basically, at which the twister sucks you up. That’s not the technical term obviously, but…

Bill: There’s only been Melissa since you.
Jo: Not much for browsing, are you?

Bill: (staring at the sky) Going green.
Dusty: Greenage!

Jo: Can I drive?
Bill: No!
Jo: Then would you?!

Belzer: ...I was just wondering if we were going to chase this tornado or if you wanted to catch the next one?

Bill: Why can’t we spend a normal day together?

Jo: Where’s my truck? [Truck smashes into the ground.] Oh, there it is.

Dusty: Red meat! We crave sustenance!

Rabbit: Rabbit is good, rabbit is wise…

Beltzer: That’s no moon! That’s a space station!

Melissa: When you used to tell me that you chase tornadoes, deep down I thought it was just a metaphor.

Aunt Meg: He didn't keep his part of the bargain.
Jo: Which part?
Aunt Meg: To spend his life pining for you, and to die miserable and alone.

[Airborne Holstein drifts past truck.]
Jo: Cow.
Melissa [on cell phone]: I’ve got to go, Julia. We’ve got cows!

Rabbit: Y’know in a severe lightning storm you should grab your ankles and stick your butt in the air.
Haynes: He’s right. If you’re going to get hit by lightning, that’s the safest orifice.

Dusty: You slaughter your own cows? Meg! Nice!

Dusty: Dude he’s going to rue the day. He’s going to rue the day he came up against the Extreme, baby. Bill, I’m talking imminent rue-age.

Aunt Meg: All right, all right, I'll go. [to the hospital] But I'm driving myself.
Rabbit: Honey, your car's in a tree around the corner.

Beltzer: He was without apparel.

DVD Review

The DVD is pretty inexpensive and if you’re into this kind of thing at all, the “Making Of” sequences are really pretty cool.

If you liked this movie, try these:

• The Day After Tomorrow
• Speed
• Independence Day