Welcome back to my disaster movie analysis series, everyone! Today, we're taking a look at:
Upon its release in May of 1996, Jan de Bont’s Twister was seen by some critics as just another example of a ‘style over substance’ blockbuster, with the late Roger Ebert going so far as to declare, "You want loud, dumb, skillful, escapist entertainment? Twister works. You want to think? Think twice about seeing it." However, I would argue this film is more than just spectacle in that it acts as a cautionary tale of how passion, if not regulated, can escalate into downright obsession.
This is accomplished through the contrast between the characters of Jo Harding and Jonas Miller, respectively. Jo works alongside a motley, yet fiercely passionate and loyal, team who chase storms in a colorful assortment of automobiles, whereas Jonas spearheads a force made up largely of uniformed men in (mostly) matching black vehicles. While Jo’s team takes great, open delight in their tornado-chasing (with one of the team members even blasting music from a speaker mounted on his van as they advance on a tornado that’s recently formed), Jonas’ men come off as colder and more strictly professional (in terms of their onscreen activities), yet arguably just as driven.
The main point in which Jo separates herself as a character from Jonas becomes evident in the movie’s second act, when she and her estranged husband Bill’s truck they’d been using is knocked over, with the tornado data-gathering sensors scattered about on the ground. Jo, desperate to finally utilize her “Dorothy” contraption on the nearby tornado, begins trying in vain to retrieve the sensors, though Bill eventually manages to snap her out of this compulsive state by encouraging her to, “Look at what you’ve got right in front of ‘ya.” Although Bill subsequently clarifies that what Jo’s ‘got’ is him, I would argue that Bill also means that Jo has her team and her Aunt Meg, thus reminding her that she still has other things besides storm-chasing to live for; this ultimately gets Jo to see reason and ‘live to fight another day’. In the climax, meanwhile, Jonas, despite being warned against advancing close to a particularly massive tornado by Jo and Bill, is too blinded by his obsession with defeating them to listen to their cautioning and ends up paying for it with his life shortly afterwards. Jonas and what happens to him are an illustration of what might’ve befallen Jo had she not been able to temper her passion for storm-chasing with Bill’s help, as Jonas’ single-mindedness is what ultimately destroys him.
This is accomplished through the contrast between the characters of Jo Harding and Jonas Miller, respectively. Jo works alongside a motley, yet fiercely passionate and loyal, team who chase storms in a colorful assortment of automobiles, whereas Jonas spearheads a force made up largely of uniformed men in (mostly) matching black vehicles. While Jo’s team takes great, open delight in their tornado-chasing (with one of the team members even blasting music from a speaker mounted on his van as they advance on a tornado that’s recently formed), Jonas’ men come off as colder and more strictly professional (in terms of their onscreen activities), yet arguably just as driven.
The main point in which Jo separates herself as a character from Jonas becomes evident in the movie’s second act, when she and her estranged husband Bill’s truck they’d been using is knocked over, with the tornado data-gathering sensors scattered about on the ground. Jo, desperate to finally utilize her “Dorothy” contraption on the nearby tornado, begins trying in vain to retrieve the sensors, though Bill eventually manages to snap her out of this compulsive state by encouraging her to, “Look at what you’ve got right in front of ‘ya.” Although Bill subsequently clarifies that what Jo’s ‘got’ is him, I would argue that Bill also means that Jo has her team and her Aunt Meg, thus reminding her that she still has other things besides storm-chasing to live for; this ultimately gets Jo to see reason and ‘live to fight another day’. In the climax, meanwhile, Jonas, despite being warned against advancing close to a particularly massive tornado by Jo and Bill, is too blinded by his obsession with defeating them to listen to their cautioning and ends up paying for it with his life shortly afterwards. Jonas and what happens to him are an illustration of what might’ve befallen Jo had she not been able to temper her passion for storm-chasing with Bill’s help, as Jonas’ single-mindedness is what ultimately destroys him.
That finishes my analysis of Twister. I found this flick to be a substantial improvement over Earthquake; the 1996 film boasts effects that've aged better in comparison to those seen in Earthquake, a far more engaging cast (especially the dearly departed Bill Paxton and Philip Seymour Hoffman), and much more enthralling disaster sequences (in that as a Kansas native, they hit closer to 'home'). As such, I certainly recommend checking this movie out! See you all in the near future with my next analysis, this time of Roland Emmerich's return to the disaster genre known as The Day After Tomorrow!
