Lisa Johnson Mandell’s Twisters review promises all the things you want in a summertime action film and more. It may just blow you away.

Not a sequel but more of a reimagining, Twisters blows the disaster genre into the 2020’s with elan, force and gusto. If you liked the 1996 disaster classic Twister with Bill Paxton, Helen Hunt and Carrie Elwes, you’ll love this new version.

And if you don’t even remember the 1996 version, we’re in the same boat. You’ll come to it with fresh eyes, expecting little more than to be entertained by Man of the Minute Glen Powell. But you’ll come away with so much more.

Powell, stars with fresh but substantial Daisy Edgar Jones, whom you may or may not have seen in Where the Crawdads Sing, and the remarkable Anthony Ramos from Hamilton, In the Heights, and the painful Transformers: Rise of the Beasts.

But it’s the tornados that are the real stars of the film. We wait for them. We fear them. We tremble before them. If you only see one film in 4DX in your entire life, this is the one to see it in. For the uninitiated, 4DX theaters have seats that rock and jolt you (reach for the seatbelts!), squirt you with air and mist, and generally feel like an amusement park ride. Twisters really is a 4D theatrical experience, and it’s definitely worth the extra few bucks for tickets.

Twisters Review: Whipping up the plot

The plot is a simple one. It focuses on tornado chasers in Oklahoma, some who seem to be doing it for fame, others for fortune, and still others to find a way to solve the tornado problem that is devastating the area of the US known as Tornado Alley. As the tornadoes twist, so do alliances, motives, and levels of confidence. It’s all good fun.

And when I say good fun, I mean it’s a decent film for the whole family. It’s nice to see a movie with characters who don’t use the F word in every other sentence (or at all).

Director Lee Isaac Chen (Minari) knows exactly who his audience is: People of all ages who just want a good time at the movies. He knows how much fun it is to see heroes, of both genders and multiple races, and knows that people go to the movies for romance, action, pathos and laughs. A film that can move, tickle, excite, and leave you breathless is a rare thing.

And so I happily add Twisters to the list of films that will save this summer for Hollywood. Enjoy!

Rated PG-13

2 Hours 2 Minutes

If this Twisters review encourages you to breeze on down to the cineplex, get times and tickets first at Fandango.com.

Lisa Johnson Mandell’s Twisters review promises all the things you want in a summertime action film and more. It may just blow you away.