Twister Review

Twister Running Commentary and Review:

Another disaster movie to review, this one is Twister starring Helen Hunt, Bill Paxton, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jamie Gertz, and Cary Elwes. Let the running commentary begin.

Running commentary -

Starts off in June 1969 and there's a family running for their storm cellar during a twister. Dad says twister might be an F-5. Trees falling and lightning. Dad locks up the cellar door and tries to hold on as the twister passes overhead. Dad and the door get sucked into the twister. AWESOME opening scene.

Starts off with Bill Paxton and Jamie Gertz driving to go meet Jo (Hunt). She and her team are getting ready for work out by a barn with their stormchasing vehicles. I have to say Helen Hunt is HOT. I don't normally like blondes but she's near the top of my list as far as blondes go.

Wait...that's PHILIP SEYMOUR HOFFMAN!

Melissa (Gertz) gets stuck with Dusty while Bill (Paxton) talks to Jo. Finds out they're running low on grant money. Everyone thinks Bill is back but he keeps telling them he isn't. Jo signs their divorce papers and then goes to meet Melissa.

Jo then takes Bill to se Dorothy, which is his creation. She shows it to him and says there's four of them. Jo and Bill explain to Melissa what it does. and how it works.

They get word of a twister coming down and they speed off toward it. Bill and Melissa follow them after Jo forgets to sign the divorce papers. They then run into Jonas on the way there. Jonas is Bill's arch-nemesis who sold them out for corporate sponsors. One of Jonas' trucks runs Bill off the road and he has to get some new tires.

Bill sees Jonas with a news crew showing them DOT 3 which is a rip-off of his Dorothy design. Bill goes over and confronts Jonas. Both stormchasing teams almost get into a fight. Jonas makes a comment about Bill's job as a weatherman and they have to keep Bill from kicking his ass. Bill decides to stay on for one day to get Dorothy in the air before Jonas can do the same with DOT 3. Great scene.

Jonas waits and sees what Bill does just as Jo predicts he's doing. Bill leads the team toward the twister. Bill and Jo have a marital dispute. Bill almost drives them off the road when he gets distracted. Everyone listens to it on the radio.

Twister on the ground and they go for it. Jo and Bill end up in the field. The twister destroys a barn. Awesome! They end up crashing into a small bridge over a stream and take cover under it as the twister passes directly over them. The twister picks up their truck before dissipating. The truck falls right in front of Melissa's truck! WOW! AWESOME SCENE!

Jo talks Bill into using his truck now that hers is gone. Bill is not too happy over this. Yet another love triangle movie storyline. Does every movie have this garbage?! lol This is like the 6th or 7th in a row.

Bill and Jonas are going after another twister. After a staredown from inside of their trucks, Bill suddenly veers off and turns the other way after realizing it's a sidewinder twister. They end up driving near water and there's three twisters over the water. A cow flies past them twice. The water spouts merge and then pass over their truck. They get spun around and the twister dissipate immediately afterward. Another great scene.

They go on a pit stop at Jo's Aunt Meg's house. They see Jonas on the TV and basically rip into him the whole time he's on. They then talk about Bill being The Extreme and tell Melissa some stories. Melissa asks about the Fujita scale (F-1, F-2, etc.) and they talk about all of them up until an F-4. Melissa asks if there's an F-5 and only one of them has seen one. The girl at the beginning was Jo and that was the time she saw an F-5.

They run out after hearing there's another tornado.

I must say that I like the rock music soundtrack to this movie a lot.

They take a shortcut through a field and end up almost running into Jonas' team while getting on the highway. They end up on the same highway as the twister. There's hail and rain as Jo and Bill gun it for the twister. Melissa tells Dusty that they're all crazy and that Jo is the craziest one of them all. The twister suddenly disappears when they get Dorothy 2 ready. The twister back builds and Dorothy 2 gets knocked over onto the road. Jo and Bill have a discussion about her obsession with twisters and Bill reveals that he still has feelings for her as Melissa listens in. Another great scene.

The group ends up staying at a motel near a drive-in movie theater. Jo gets a pen and signs the divorce papers.

The television suddenly goes out as Melissa is watching it. Bill looks at the night sky. He realizes that the twister is there just as Dusty says the twister is coming for them. The twister rips up the drive-in as The Shining is playing. They all take cover in a car garage and the twister rips off part of the ceiling. Melissa freaks out over all of this. Great scene.

Aunt Meg looks out from her bedroom and it's storming there too.

After what happens they check the damage. Dusty tells them it's headed for Wakita where Aunt Meg is at. Melissa says she's going back home and breaks it off with him. Says she can't compete with this and says goodbye.

They arrive in Wakita and found Aunt Meg's house almost completely destroyed after the twister hit. The rest of the area looks like a bomb went off. Jo and Bill go in to find Meg. They find Meg and get her out quickly before the house collapses. Bill goes back in and saves her dog just before the house collapses.

After this Jo and Meg have a chat in the ambulance. Dusty interrupts and tells them they're predicting an F-5. Jo and Bill figure out how to make Dorothy work after seeing Meg's artwork on the yard spinning. Really good movie so far.

They drive toward the F-5 and it's HUGE! HOLY CRAP!

Jo and Bill drive up to the F-5 and put Dorothy 3 on the road. It doesn't work and Dorothy gets slammed onto the ground. A giant log is pushed under their truck as the twister is coming right at them. They barely escape when a gas truck is pushed into them but narrowly avoid it crashing into them after escaping. Great scene.

Jonas is right along side of it on the opposite side. Bill tries to tell them it could shift its track and come right at them. The base of it is a mile wide. Bill tells them its shifting and Jo tries to warn them too. A giant metal object flies through the window and kills Eddie the driver and Jonas is killed after the truck is picked up and slammed into the ground.

Giant debris now falling in front of their truck. Large farming equipment and ultimately a house.

They set the truck in cruise and drive it toward the twister. They jump out at three and it works. Everyone celebrates.

Bill and Jo are stuck with the twister coming right at them. They run to a nearby farm for safety.

They hide in the barn but there's metal sharp tools everywhere on the ceiling.

Bill finds a pipe well in the barn and uses a heavy duty belt to tie them to it to keep them from being sucked into the twister. They end up in the middle of it and his plan works but just barely. As usual with this movie the twister dissipates right after reaching them. How convenient.

They are safe and talk about Dorothy working and getting more grants. They debate about whose doing analysis or running the lab. Jo and Bill are back together and Bill's back on the team. Sappy ending but the visual of the tornado's path on the ground is pretty awesome. Great visual there.

Overall:

4 out of 5 stars. My only complaints were the typical love triangle storyline that I've continually seen in just about every movie I've reviewed so far on this blog. Also the tornado suddenly disappearing after passing over the protaganists got old as well. That got old after awhile. Other than that this was really good. The visuals were great and Paxton, Hunt, and Hoffman all were great. I will recommend this movie. Good stuff.