Night of the Twisters: Review and Commentary

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Welcome to Night of the Twisters: Review and Commentary.

   Night of the Twisters is a movie made for television adaptation of Ivy Ruckman's book. Ruckman's book is told from the point of view of the young Daniel Hatch who witnesses a tornado outbreak near Grand Island, Nebraska, in 1980. In that situation, Grand Island was ravaged but up to seven tornadoes in less than three hours, leaving five dead and injuring 200. Three of the tornadoes that hit were F1s, on the old Fajita scale, and caused little damage (as they touched down on the edge of town or outside it), two were F3s, one was an F2, and one was an F4 that cut a path of destruction across the south side of Grand Island, killing four. Three of the twisters were anti-cyclonic, that is they spun the opposite direction of most tornadoes in the hemisphere (normally, tornadoes rotate counter-clockwise in the Northern and clockwise in the southern, while anti-cyclonic funnels rotate the other way in either one), an action that is very rare; about 1 out of 99. After the tornadoes left, Grand Island was a disaster zone that slowly healed. 

   Ruckman's book takes middle and high school readers into the disaster with Dan as he narrates. The character is fictional while the event is real. That's why it's called historical fiction. The book was published four years after the event and is still read today. 

  However, this review is not about the book but the adaptation. It was around the early Nineties that The Family Channel, now called ABC Family, decided to turn the book into a film. The adaptation took many liberties of the story and characters. For example, in the book, Dan Hatch is a child, practically in the 6th grade, whereas in the movie he is now a teenager. They also abandoned the actual tornado event in Grand Island and replaced it with a fictional event in a fictional town of Blainsworth, Nebraska. How did the finished product turn out?

   The film opens somewhere near Dannebrog where a truck with Kansas City Tornado Center on the sides drives along a deserted road. Its driver watches the clouds east of him and then reports to a guy named Stan. While monitoring the storm, he sees a tornado form "about a mile from [his location], heading south". Then, to his horror, he sees it head to a farm where a girl has just returned from school. He goes to warn the family there who are apparently oblivious to the storm. I always wondered how come the kids on the bus or the driver did not see the funnel. Also, shouldn't the absence of the chickens alert the farmers to danger? Or would someone who lives in tornado prone locations be more observant to storms like that? 

   Well, the family is warned and they take cover while the man in the truck narrowly avoids getting sucked in by the tornado. 

   After the titles, we are then sent to Blainsworth where Dan Hatch loses a bike race he was in during the town's fall festival. Angry at himself, he parks on a curb and he chats with Arthur and his grandma and aunt. Then his father appears who keeps pushing him to finish the race, first in a joking manner and then ordering him as Dan argues. As Dan goes across the finish line, he hears his name on the raffle ticket. 

   Oh yes, look for something of the old times where a man is listening to the radio on a boom box. It might have seemed right in the seventies and the eighties but by then most people were using ear phones. Of course, the man, and Jack, Dan's father, don't seem to be listening to the weather report. I don't know if it's common for Nebraskans to be this complacent during severe weather so I won't really comment on it. The lack of the characters commenting on how good the day felt, or how warm, is missing. I know it was filmed in Canada, but that is no excuse. In fact, Jack is more concerned of a loan being turned down by the bank as he's store was floundering. The scene does make for a good plot line: that Jack has ideas of a sports store that would help the town's economy and yet the bank is not going to give him a loan to boost that store up. Would have led to the all too familiar scenario of an unfeeling banker refusing to loan money to a struggling entrepreneur, or in this case, the scenario happening while a tornado outbreak is coming and after the same outbreak is when the banker has a change of heart, if he survived, that is.

   Dan Hatch is played by Devon Sawa in this movie and Jack is played by John Schneider, known for being Bo Duke in The Dukes of Hazard. The fact that their characters have the same first letter in the first name is not lost this viewer. So, while Dan goes off with his new bike and his best friend, Arthur, we see the storms get closer while the town doesn't give a thought to it. During the scenes leading up to the night, we see the storm's progress with notices saying how many miles northwest of Blainsworth and what time.

   Dan and Arthur meet up with Stacy and Ronnie Vae at a park, have a little talk, and then ride off, laughing at the girls for tripping the trap they set up. Stacy's reaction to it is priceless, and the fact that Dan has a crush on her shows in two instances. First, when Stacy announces their parents are going on (I know, bad timing) Dan asks who was to look after them before Stacy said she was. Later, he tries to warn the girls of the trap before Arthur cuts him off. He also offers a ride home on his bike, which she turns down because she prefers Harleys. Dan was told by Jack to walk Grandma Belle's dog after the race but he forgets. When Dan goes over, the dog has to go to the vet anyway and Jack gets reminded that he use to be a teenager who would skirt responsibilities. 

   Dan's mom, Laura, works at a diner called Salty Dawg, which is where she is after dinner. In comparison to the book, Mrs. Hatch is more caring and less stressed out. So now, Dan's problems with his dad make up the conflict besides the storms. Looking at it carefully, I can see that Dan is a little self-absorbed, even if he is young and attempting to find his own path. I do have a problem with the way his mouth is hanging open in many key scenes. He and Jack rarely exchange a kind word in the early scenes and it stems with their passions. Jack was once a football player in high school, and like any he has dreams of his son being an athlete. However, Dan is more of an artist than an athlete. The thing of the jock father and not so athletic son is a common trope for movies and tv shows in the decade, which has made it a gag and a cliche. Then there's Ryan, who is just a baby. The book brings up Dan's nostalgia for the days before he came, including the socializing dinner scenes when Arthur comes to call. This is not in the film, however. There's one additional character who is not in the original Ruckman book, Grandma Belle is a composite of many smaller characters with a bad case of rheumatism. When Jack visits her, she feels pains that she says have been felt for "a long time." Later she is shown sleeping while the phone rings, implying her to be out or dead (which suggests someone should have been in her house that night).

   So, on this night, Laura goes to work at the diner and the weather man from the prologue comes in just as a weather report arrives. One nervous patron suggests hitting the road to avoid tornadoes though the weather man suggests otherwise. "Most people killed by tornadoes are caught driving their cars," he says. He picks up some coffee and continues on. One thing to point out is how the patrons react to his statement. The man who wanted to leave just frowns at him while a female behind just rolls her eyes and walks away. We do not know what happened to the said character, however. Laura calls up Jack who also reports on the bulletins. One of these bulletins happens while Dan and Arthur get some pie and Jack is watching something on television. The latest says "a tornado has been reported fourteen miles northwest of Blainsworth and the National Weather Service has issued a Tornado Warning for St. Paul, Dannebrog, and Rural Howard County." Where I live, in recent years, that is, if any county comes under a Tornado Warning in the market viewing area of any station, all regular programming is suspended while the weatherman gets on the air to tell us what storm prompted the warning, where it's heading, and rather or not there's a tornado in it. After experiencing Texas, I can conclude that not all states do the same, so I cannot fault the movie on this when the weatherman just tells them a county is under the warning and then shuts off. This was a different time also which leads to examples of a few older preparations for severe weather.

   So, Dan and Arthur go about to unplug the appliances because they can blow up when lightning hits the house. I cannot confirm this but I know that certain things in the house shouldn't be on during a lightning storm (which is also why I don't take showers during it either). Jack leaves to check on Grandma Belle, Laura calls the house after he leaves, and Dan hears the phone go dead. Through out this evening, Dan handles things like a boy, mostly being indifferent to it. When Jack tells him to unplug things, he reacts with the teenage attitude "I know, I know, I know." He even has to be reminded to not forget Ryan. Yet, when the phone goes dead, and with all the grown ups gone, he appears scared and when he attempts to remain calm while telling Arthur not to leave, he only makes Arthur feel nervous, a normal reaction to severe weather. Arthur recites facts about tornadoes, claiming the storm will get farther away, which sounds reassuring until the siren goes off. I know of a meteorologist who is frustrated at the "siren mentality" locals have; being that people rely on them to know when to do something in this time of smart apps, continuous coverage, and Doppler radar. Of course, this film takes place in 1996 and it's in a small town in the Plains, but I cannot help but feel that Dan and Arthur's reaction to the siren's howl is an example of "siren mentality." If you don't believe me than re-watch the scene on YouTube and take note how they only jump up when it starts to blare and then stand down when it stops. Dan and Arthur should know that just because the siren is not blaring that doesn't mean it's all clear. The dead calm Dan hears means danger because that's usually when there's a tornado close. But Dan and Arthur not only stand down but they put Baby Ryan back in his crib. There's another thing in the scene that dates the movie. When the siren starts to blare, Arthur and Dan open up the windows in the house, something that was once thought to keep the house from exploding. That theory has long been exploded because it actually aggravates, rather than prevents, the destruction of the house by explosion (there's an interesting moment where when they do so, a movie they were previously watching has a man turn his back to the camera and take care of something, as though to open up his window).

  Another thing that Hollywood does is make a tornado hitting things become something like earthquakes. This film is no exception because things begin to shake as the tornado gets close. On the second time the tornado siren sounds, Dan runs up stairs for Ryan. Then the siren shuts off and he just says "can't you make up your mind?" This really makes one want to hit Dan on the head and say "grab the baby, you stupid idiot!" When Arthur tries to get the weather channel (since he didn't have it on it earlier) and only gets a screen that says "Tornado Warning" (the book has "CD" for "Civil Defense Emergency") to which Arthur doesn't know what it means. Today, the screen would have said "Tornado Emergency" but this was before the Moore Tornado of 1999. Arthur panics and tries to leave but Dan keeps him inside just as the water is sucked out of a toilet and goes up a stink pipe (not its purpose). A strange, unearthly howl sounds as the power goes out. Only then do Arthur and Dan collect Ryan and get under the basement, though as close as the funnel is in the film, it'd be too late. They get in the bathroom of the basement, instead of under the stairs or a heavy table, and cover themselves with the blanket while the house is torn up above them. If it weren't so tense and dramatic, one could just see how B-rated the effects of the house's destruction looks. Even the tornado looks fake.

   After the house is destroyed, Dan and Arthur pull themselves and Ryan out of the rubble and go look for survivors. One thing about Dan at this point is that he shows signs of maturing. He is a boy who is thrust into becoming a man as a result of the storm. Thus we have the theme of boy becoming a man. When he and Arthur encounter Stacy and Ronnie Vae, he volunteers to drive the dead man's car. When he comes to the road block, he talks with the head of the road block, who knows him enough to point out that he shouldn't be driving anyway. Dan takes a moment to get everyone else out of the car, though Stacey remains, before plowing through the road block. Then he finds his grandma's house has been hit and Grandma Belle is injured. They also find Jack trapped under his truck and injured. Dan is able to get the people at the road block to help him help his father out. When Jack comes out, he simply says to Dan "thank you, son." We have heard Jack say "thank you" but not in the way that sounds good in one's ears. For the most part, he and Dan are never exchanging a kind word. So, this moment is the first time such an exchange happens; Dan shows his is useful while Jack thanks him. 

    However, when they are at the police station, Jack decides to go look for Laura on his own, leading to another argument with Dan. It is from this that Dan reveals to Stacy, and the audience, that Jack is not his real father. His real father, Daniel, died when he was six from an airplane accident. Some time after, Laura married Jack and because they were so different, there is division between the two. Dan mentions some good points of Jack: "he works hard, he's good to my mom, he can be funny at times." I may not be a stepfather myself, or even a father at all, yet, but I'd like to think that if one had those three qualifications he'd be good for the children as well as their mother. We all know that with single moms, widows, widowers, divorced dads, any who have children old enough to speak their minds, it is not enough to have the support of children's guardian, in the way that people who don't have children would make it easy for us. With those who have children, there is now more people to get approval off which means there is more work involved in the marriage. Given something like this, it makes one believe that Jack and Dan should have a better relationship. It is also why I find the drama of the family more interesting than the tornadoes in this film. 

    Meanwhile, Laura and Aunt Jenny (who picks her up, somehow, yet parks her car at quite a distance from the diner despite the lack of other cars, in the pouring rain, and suggest taking cover inside) dodge a twister, where Laura gets hit in the face by a flying trash can lid, and head to a shelter where we see the horrors of the wounded in tornadoes. We don't see someone die but are told that three people are confirmed dead. We are also informed that the weather man from the prologue is named Bob Irisen and he is the man asked to give a report on the weather in one scene. Much of the science of tornadoes is skewed or ignored in the movie. Bob mentions the system going southeast instead of northeast (much of the last is because they are pulled by low level jets in the atmosphere prompted by a low pressure system and it combines the cold and dry air from the north with warm and moist air that is rising from the tropics). Just how a severe storm can travel south instead of north is never explained, nor are we given any details of the warm and cold fronts. A little bit of information is necessary for anyone who doesn't understand it or doesn't live in the US. Tornado spawning thunderstorms are usually created when vigorous troughs push out of the Rockies and bring out a low pressure system or two into the plains. It is pushed eastward by a 150 miles an hour jet stream. The low pressure system pulls in cold, dry air from up north and warm, moist tropical air from the Gulf of Mexico. This kind of set up creates imbalance in the atmosphere as increase in wind speeds in the higher levels of the sky mixed with rising in temperatures and humidity. This instability leads to numerous thunderstorms, normally. However, with this kind of set up with troughs, jet streams, differing weather fronts meeting, and low pressure systems bringing it together can intensify thunderstorms until they become severe, leading to frequent lightning, large hail, gusty winds, intense flooding, as well as tornadoes. Most of the intense tornadoes form in storms that form ahead of the cold front in the warm sector, which can also lead to violent and long track tornadoes that grow very large. The system then follows with a squall line of thunderstorms with spin up tornadoes, gusty winds, lightning, torrential rain, and hail, all of which are just as lethal as the storms that preceded them. Night of the Twisters ignores these facts in order to put up a ridiculous scenario of a rogue storm. "This storm is a monster," Bob confesses. "It's not behaving in predictable way."

    Bob is also given a talk with Jenny, whose car broke down. Jenny, who calls Dan "Tiger", has had series of boyfriends during her whole life yet never met the one. She tells Laura before the tornado that she would give anything to have what she has. She never married Jack, possibly because Laura got him first or she is not into jocks. Her bad luck is shown in the fact that her ex-boyfriend has been cheating on her and lied about it. After labeling all men in Blainsworth as jerks, she considers it a miracle to find a nice guy. Yet when she is with Bob, they have a genuine chat that suggests romance. This romance is not developed much. Not as much as Dan and Stacy's, which seems like normal teenage romance. It's also nice to see a teenage romance that didn't focus on sex. 

   The film goes into the night with Dan and Ryan going with Jack, who didn't like the idea, as they go looking for Laura. They learn that Laura, Jenny, and Bob were heading to home to find them. They all meet at the ruins and its a nice reunion. But, of course, the film makers decided to add a more exciting climax to the film by having three tornadoes appear suddenly beside the humans and then have a chase, though it's against Bob's better judgement. The chase scene is just something to give John Schneider fans something to be appreciated because there is no way those vehicles could out run twisters, especially on rubble choked roads. We are also treated to one reason how it's dangerous when a third car follows and is sucked in by the funnel. Then, just to add more nail biting tension, Jack gets knocked out by a tree branch hitting the windshield, leaving Dan to guide the car through town. That car is very close to the twister yet is never tossed around. Jack finally wakes up as they reach the underpass of a highway, which is not a safe place to be. The tunnel effect doesn't suck anything out but it breaks the rear windows of the car and almost sucks Dan out. Jack and Laura hold on to him but it's obvious that they are no match for the wind. 

   Like in The War of the Worlds, it takes an act of God to save the main characters. At the last minute, the tornado dissipates and the storm subsides. The Hatch family has a group hug, emerges from the car, and Jack tells Dan how proud he is of him and Dan smiles and thanks Jack. They then walk out into the morning glow with Jack's voice over narrating, claiming the town "had been ravaged by anywhere from ten to fifteen tornadoes, leaving five dead, dozen injured, and twelve hundred homeless." While the book is willing to give a chapter to the recovery, we are not shown it in the movie, possibly because they had to sacrifice it for the chase scene. In real life, there would be days after with people removing debris, rebuilding buildings, finding lost items, recovery bodies, and the National Guard sent to locations while charity drives were set up in locations. None of those sort of things are shown in Night of the Twisters. Instead, we have Dan narrate while a montage of photographs tells us where everyone is now. We find that Jack became a coach of a high school football team, took up new hobbies, and his store recovered, Arthur was elected class president, Dan and Stacy became a couple and had their prom date together, Bob and Jenny married and are expecting twins, and Grandma Belle died the following spring. Above all, Blainsworth, Nebraska recovered and is a thriving town now. 

   Night of the Twisters has the strongest points in the character scenes involving the family but some of them are just not good characters. At least Dan improves over the course of the film, as does Jack. Everyone else is one dimensional and hardly change, Jenny's romance with Bob is rushed, and the science of tornadoes is never followed. The special effects are dated, of course, though the films that came out the same year are not any better. At times, it looks as though there is no tornado on the set. The chase scene is pointless and stupid. There is also that annoying "pop pop tack pa pop pop" in the sound track. I believe the film makers try to make it be like in Jaws, where it would sound and a tornado appears minutes later. It doesn't really work, especially since we have sound effects for that. Above all, the film is better when there are no tornadoes involved, which is ironic. The film is secular, mostly, with almost no references to God, except for exclaiming in horror, (though Dan is seen praying when he, Arthur, and Ryan are in the basement shower during the main twister) yet a few Christian themes show up. Dan answers Cain's question that he is his brother's keeper during the tornado and always makes sure there is someone to look after him at every turn. But the greatest is with Jack and Dan in their conflict that leads to examples of Colossians 3:21 and Ephesians 6:4. In a way, the film's climax is an example of Psalms 103:13, as Jack holds tightly to Dan as the tornado tries to suck him out.

  That wraps up with Night of the Twisters. The place to find it is on the internet, especially on YouTube. I once had a copy of it on video, but gave it away after the Super Outbreak of 2011. Unfortunately, there is not a copy of it on DVD in any video stores since it was discontinued a few years ago. In fact, it's out of print. So, as long as it's online, this is the only way to view it. One thing to add, for those of you, come spring, when your region sees the peak tornado location, do not use this movie as an example to follow whenever you experience severe weather. Just use common sense and go over your safety plan and pay close attention to the reports instead. They will likely reward you with your life.