Twister is a 1996 American disaster film directed by Jan de Bont and written by Michael Crichton and Anne-Marie Martin. The film stars an ensemble cast that includes Helen Hunt, Bill Paxton, Jami Gertz, and Cary Elwes. Lois Smith, Alan Ruck, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Jeremy Davies, Todd Field, Zach Grenier, Nicholas Sadler, Abraham Benrubi, Jake Busey, and Scott Thomson also star in supporting roles. Its plot follows a group of storm chasers trying to deploy a tornado research device during a severe outbreak in Oklahoma. Amblin Entertainment co-founder Steven Spielberg was initially attached to direct, and several directors were in talks to direct before De Bont signed on after leaving Godzilla; Spielberg would executive-produce the film with Walter F. Parkes, Laurie MacDonald, and Gerald R. Molen. Filming was done across Oklahoma, with several key sequences filmed in Fairfax, Ralston, Maysville, Guthrie, and Stillwater. Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) handled the visual effects and animation of the tornadoes, with the Dynamotion software being used to develop the basis of the digital tornadoes. Twister premiered in Westwood, Los Angeles, on May 8, 1996, and was theatrically released on May 10, 1996, in the United States and Canada by Warner Bros. Pictures, and internationally by Universal Pictures through United International Pictures. The film grossed over $499 million worldwide, becoming the second-highest-grossing film of 1996, and selling an estimated 54.7 million tickets in the United States. It received generally positive reviews from critics and Academy Award nominations for Best Visual Effects and Best Sound. It is also notable for being among the first films to be released on DVD in the United States. A standalone sequel, Twisters, was released in 2024.
Plot On an Oklahoma farm in 1969, young Jo Thornton, her parents, and their dog Toby take shelter from an F5 tornado that destroys their farm and kills Jo's father. 27 years later, Jo is a tornado-obsessed meteorologist leading a team of storm chasers. Her estranged husband, Bill Harding, an ex-storm chaser turned television weatherman, travels to Oklahoma with his fiancée Melissa to obtain Jo's signature on their divorce papers. Jo shows Bill the realized "Dorothy", a device containing hundreds of small weather sensors that he conceptualized. Dorothy could revolutionize tornado research and potentially provide an earlier storm-warning system, but the device must be deployed dangerously close to a tornado to work. Jo's team rushes off to chase a developing storm, forcing Bill and Melissa to follow. Jonas Miller, a rival storm chaser with corporate funding, stole Bill's idea for his own Dorothy-like device, Dot3. Bill agrees to accompany Jo and the team for one day to launch Dorothy. As the team pursues a rope tornado, Jo's truck runs into a ditch attempting to intercept it. Jo and Bill are forced to take shelter under a bridge, resulting in the truck and one of the four Dorothy prototypes being destroyed. Bill leads the team in his own truck, chasing another tornado. They chase the tornado, now a waterspout, onto Kaw Lake that is accompanied by another with multiple vortices. The waterspout thrashes the truck around, leaving them unharmed, but Melissa is traumatized in the process. The team visits Jo's Aunt Meg in nearby Wakita for rest and food. The team then scrambles to chase a developing twister. Jo and Bill intercept a tornado with unpredictable movements. It knocks over power lines that crush Dorothy II. With the truck damaged, Bill forces them to retreat. Jo rants about her father's death. Bill admits his feelings for Jo, unaware that Melissa is overhearing them through the CB radio. The team overnights in Fairview and Jo signs the divorce papers. A nocturnal tornado forces the team and others into a garage pit near a drive-in theater for protection. The tornado destroys the garage and two team vehicles, and injures several people before proceeding toward Wakita. Before the team rushes there, Melissa ends her relationship with Bill, encouraging him to reunite with Jo. The Tornado leaves Wakita in ruins and flattens Aunt Meg's house. The team rescues Aunt Meg, who only has minor injuries, and her dog, Mose, who is unharmed. The National Severe Storms Laboratory forecasts that a potentially record-breaking tornado will form the next day. Inspired by Aunt Meg's wind-vane sculptures, Bill and Jo add aluminum "wings" to the last two Dorothy prototype sensors, making them more aerodynamic. True to the forecast, a mile-wide F5 tornado forms the next day, and the team pursues it. Bill and Jo attempt to place Dorothy III in its path; however, the device is knocked over and destroyed by an airborne tree. Meanwhile, Jonas attempts to deploy Dot3, ignoring Bill and Jo's warnings that the tornado is changing direction and headed straight at him, as well as that Dot3's packaging was too light and needed to be anchored down. The tornado sweeps Jonas's truck away, killing him and his driver Eddie, as well as destroying Dot3, leaving their team devastated. With the last remaining Dorothy affixed to the bed of Bill's truck, Bill and Jo drive directly at the tornado, then jump out, sacrificing the truck to ensure that Dorothy IV can release its probes into the wedge. Dorothy IV's probes provide immediate scientific data, but without their truck, Jo and Bill are forced to run as the tornado shifts toward them. Inside a nearby pumphouse on a farm, they strap themselves to deep pipes. As the building rips away, the F5's core passes over them and they find themselves inverted in the vortex. After the tornado dissipates, the team celebrates their success while Jo and Bill reconcile.
Cast
Production
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