OK 'Twisters' twirls into summer

 

Quick takes after watching Twisters, a semi-sequel to the popular 1996 blockbuster.

1. Advances in effects have made tornadoes feel more nerve-rattling than they were in 1979. But if you rewatch the 1979 movie, you may be surprised to discover that the effects don’t look hopelessly dated. The new movie's strategy: To convey and underscore tornadic ferocity in Oklahoma's tornado alley and then repeat. After that, do it again.

2. The new edition rewrites one of the original's equations, pitting greedy capitalism (a real estate company exploits tragedy by underpaying for tornado damaged homes) against do-good impulses. Good-guy storm chasers help those whose lives are destroyed by tornadoes. They also struggle to disarm lethal twisters.

3. Bill Paxton and Helen Hunt (as a divorced couple reunited in their fight against tornadoes) were a more interesting pair than Glenn Powell and Daisy Edgar-Jones. Powell plays Tyler Owens, a cowboy storm chaser from Arkansas, a subculture superstar who calls himself "The Tornado Wrangler." Powell underscores his magnetism and proves that in movies, a gleaming smile can outdo a tornado. Edgar-Jones, passable.

4. Twisters has been criticized for ignoring global warming as a contributor to increasingly powerful and more frequent tornadoes. Rising temperatures are mentioned, but, hey, this is an aspiring summer blockbuster; it wasn't written by Bill Nye, the science guy.

5. The screenplay toys with another conflict found in the original -- individual creativity vs. organizational conformity; the split allows for the introduction of underutilized supporting characters, colorful individuals who defy corporate authority, Keep an eye out for Sasha Lane and Brandon Perea.

6. If you’re familiar with the original, you’ll notice that director Lee Isaac Chung restates but tries to freshen plot points from the original. An example: A visit to Aunt Meg (Lois Smith) in the original becomes a stop at the home of Kate’s mom (Maura Tierney). I didn’t mind. 

7. Chung, widely hailed for the indie hit Minari, tries to layer a melancholic tone into the proceedings: Tornadoes can wipe out years of old-fashioned striving in an instant.

8. Some of the set pieces are great, including one in which a movie theater is destroyed, its screen ripped to shreds, thereby hinting at the destruction of theater culture or maybe trying to pit escapist thrills against the real thing, which — of course — is a little weird for a movie in which the storms are artificially created.

9. Chung doesn’t have the kind of sardonic streak that might have given the story more edge. An example: He presents a rodeo as a shining example of Americana, even though it’s disrupted by a tornado. He unabashedly celebrates the open spaces of the American heartland.

10. Do the characters have psychological resonance? Edgar-Jones’s Kate is driven by guilt over losing her significant other during an early picture prologue involving an experiment gone awry. A one-time bull rider, Tyler tells her to ride her fears, not face them. When it comes to motivation, the movie scores a meh.

11. What about the romance between Tyler and Kate? In another wrinkle, Anthony Ramos plays the chaser who lures Kate back into storm chasing but loses the love game to Powell. The movie’s love triangle is rigged; the deck is stacked against Ramos's character from the beginning.

11. Tired of this yet?

12.  Me, too.

13.  All in all, Twisters is a reasonably effective attempt at creating a summer box office storm that delivers what it promises. But a word of caution:  It’s possible to grow weary of getting pounded by tornado after tornado (I eventually did). It's possible, though, that some will see the punishing stream of tornadoes as a virtue, even if the vividly presented storms aren't  likely to boost Oklahoma tourism.

Can 'gay' be prayed away?

Set in 1993, The Miseducation of Cameron Post features another solid performance by Chloe Grace Moretz, this time as a teenage lesbian who's sent to a program where she's supposed to pray away her gay. Moretz's Cameron finds herself in trouble when she's discovered in the backseat of a car with a girlfriend (Quinn Shephard). Director Desiree Akhavan adapts a young adult novel by Emily Danforth in realistic fashion, taking us inside an operation called "God's Promise." The adults who run God's Promise aren't total ogres. They seem to genuinely believe that it's possible to "cure" gayness; they believe that their work will result in better lives for their charges. Jennifer Ehle portrays the chilly Dr. Lydia Marsh, head of the program. John Gallagher Jr. plays her brother, a man who assists with the program. Gallacher's character says faith helped him overcome his own SSA; i.e., same-sex attraction. Cameron soon finds kindred spirits in this strange environment, making friends with Jane (Sasha Lane of American Honey) and Adam (Forrest Goodluck of The Revenant). The movie's trio of misfits has no interest in overcoming gayness or submitting to someone else's idea of religious piety. These kids simply want to be themselves, an aspiration the movie clearly endorses. Miseducation's young cast adds welcome authenticity to a story that doesn't feel quite as original or daring as we might have expected.

A relaxed, enjoyable father/daughter tale

Heart Beats Loud is one of those laid-back movies that isn't out to oversell you on anything. Set in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn, the movie tells the story of a father and daughter who make music together. The twist: The daughter (an appealing Kiersey Clemons) has ambitions that go beyond music. She's about to start college and wants to be a doctor. Dad (a relaxed but sometimes dour Nick Offerman) thinks the two should try to pursue a musical career together, particularly because Clemons' Sam has an obviously potent talent. But it’s Offerman's Frank who dreams of striking musical gold. A hit record could liberate him from the failing, vinyl-only record store over which he presides. He'd like to make music, not sell it. The songs -- pleasing enough -- are interrupted by whispers of a plot involving Offerman’s character’s mom (Blythe Danner); his landlady (Toni Collette) and his bartender friend (Ted Danson). A romance between Clemons' character and a young woman played by American Honey's Sasha Lane doesn't add much, but the movie is relaxed enough to accommodate a bit of meandering. Offerman has a sly way of commanding the screen, avoiding any of the ingratiating gestures that would have turned Frank into an off-beat role model. Director Brett Haley (I'll See You in My Dreams) may not dig deep, but his movie wanders into summer buoyed by the odd couple chemistry of a father who may have more growing up to do than his brightly ambitious daughter.