Review: Into the Storm

A hellacious super-storm as experienced by storm-chasers both hi-tech (Matt Walsh, Jeremy Sumpter, and single mum Sarah Wayne Callies) and hillbilly (annoying YouTube thrill-seekers played by Kyle Davis and Jon Reep), a local teenager (Max Deacon), his crush (Alycia Debnam-Carey), his brother (Nathan Kress), and his assistant principal father (Richard Armitage).

 

Although it won’t earn any awards for screenwriting, this 2014 disaster movie is at least a significant upgrade from the dopey 1996 attempt at this kind of thing, Jan De Bont’s clichéd “Twister”. Directed by Steven Quale (“Final Destination 5”) and scripted by John Swetnam (“Step Up: All In”), this one has a significant FX upgrade from the earlier film, and takes itself more seriously than the “Sharknado” franchise. In fact, while it takes some time to get going, the film ends up just stepping over into recommendation territory. It would’ve been even better if it weren’t for the idiot yokel YouTube storm chasers, who are a constant irritation in their every scene. None of the other characters are especially memorable, but at least they’re not annoying dickheads (Truth be told, I think anyone who ‘loves’ storms is a sicko in need of a padded cell. Storms are scary and potentially dangerous).

 

For the most part, the acting is quite decent for this kind of thing. “Veep” actor Matt Walsh probably fares best as an opportunistic storm chaser with a custom-built storm-proof vehicle that is about to get an intense road testing. Max Deacon and stunning Aussie Alycia Debnam-Carey are pretty impressive and easy to like as well. On the other hand, a non-Thorin looking Richard Armitage is a bit wooden, and Sarah Wayne Callies (as a weather expert who rarely gets to see her young daughter) has a somewhat unpleasant screen presence that has never won me over. She can certainly act a bit, but I just find her off-putting, especially on “The Walking Dead” (before I gave up on that show for being too samey every week).

 

Other than the dopey rednecks and a weak re-tread of the father-son dynamic from “The Day After Tomorrow”, I really only have minor complaints. For instance, the sky looked remarkably blue 16 minutes in for a ‘super storm’ movie that runs less than 90 minutes. When we are told that the storm is gonna hit within the hour, it looks at least two hours away! 24 minutes in, however, and the sky looks borderline apocalyptic. That’s what, 8 minutes and it’s changed that much? Here it is, folks, the one case where you probably can claim that climate change is bullshit (Sorry right-wingers. Climate change is real. And shouldn’t be a partisan issue anyway). Even “The Day After Tomorrow” (one of the best of this sort of thing in the last couple of decades) wasn’t this ridiculous. However, once the storm does hit, the film is on point. It’s really, really well-done, and well ahead of anything in “Twister”, as it should be given it was released in 2014, not 1996. There’s lots on show here, including an aftermath image of a crushed school bus (presumably empty) is pretty damn effective. On a visual level, this is really amazing stuff, and quite scarily real at times. There’s one really fucking awesome FX shot of a fire being swept up into a twister to create a flaming twister. I have no idea on the science of that, but it’s just fucking amazing. There’s an absolutely masterful aerial shot towards the end too, selling the post-storm devastation. There’s only one or two moments in the film where I felt like the twisters weren’t really there interacting with everyone and everything else on the screen. So it’s pretty authentic-looking (I’m sure the storms lifting stationed aeroplanes in the air are bullshit, but it’s a great visual nonetheless), which is vital for something like this, you certainly don’t watch a disaster film for compelling story and characters.

 

I was expecting a shaky-cam nightmare with this film (although it’s not a found footage film, nearly everyone seems to have a handheld camera in it), but although it’s a lot more stably shot than that. This is a slightly more than decent disaster film with terrific disaster scenes, but with a story that could’ve been more original (And where the hell did Debnam-Carey get to at the end? We needed a kiss at the end, damn it!). Remove the irritating and unnecessary redneck twits as well and you’d have a much better film. It’s a long way from the best in the disaster genre (“The Poseidon Adventure”, “The Towering Inferno”, “The Cassandra Crossing”), but it’s an easy watch nonetheless so long as you have an appreciation for a film like this, as I do. A very, very soft recommendation, but a recommendation nonetheless.

 

Rating: B-