Movie Review: Twisters
https://open.spotify.com/episode/3niW27FXmP7nhy8AV3pfiP?si=-M6fmnaMTCekszps_MS55Q
There was an article in a few outlets in the lead-up and immediate aftermath of the release of Twisters that talked about how it was a problem that the film did not directly address the climate crisis that plagues reality. I read this article before watching the movie (something I don't usually do because I tend to try and watch movies knowing as little as possible outside trailers) but I thought this would be an interesting thing to look for as I watch the movie.
Maybe this was the thing that made me more positive on the movie than I would ordinarily be because, at the end of the day, it's a solid but otherwise forgettable disaster movie that I would put on the same level as say Independence Day. When the effects work, they're great and the film is carried by strong performances from Daisy Edgar-Jones, Anthony Ramos, David Corenswet, and Glenn Powell.
That said, to say that the movie does not address climate change is just willful ignorance. It's the same issue that plagued the release of Civil War where subtlety (and keep in mind, we are talking about Twisters here) is lost if we aren't being hit overtly over the head with a political message of the movie. True, the phrase "climate change" is never said in the movie, but that does not mean that it is completely absent from the film. There is a reference to the fact that the storms and tornados are getting progressively worse and these "once in a generation" storms are happening more and more often.
The problem is that this message is buried deep in probably the single most stereotypical "Middle America" major release in quite some time. Glenn Powell's Tyler is the single most Texan man on a screen of any kind (despite being from Arkansas in the movie) since Cordell Walker, the soundtrack is almost entirely country music, and there are more Ram trucks in this film than there are people living in the entire state of Montana. If one watches the movie at face value, it's easy to just say this is a film that will appeal to conservative Middle America in the same way Yellowstone does, however, the politics of the film could not be more clear to anyone who understands how to watch a movie and understand subtext. Beyond the fact that climate change does loom large over the movie as a kind of ever-present cause of the danger, one of the major moral moments of the movie has the protagonists realize that the people with power and money have no interest in solving the problem but would rather just find a way to monetize the damage and misery that comes as a result of them.
All I'm asking is that people who discuss movies online at major publications understand what they're watching. It's a small request but apparently one that needs to be made because it's not being done now. This is a five-star movie under our scale so we probably will be reworking the scale at some point in the future so a movie being shot and designed for the theatrical experience do not immediately get the five-star rating.
★★★★★
