Into the Storm.
Rated M (mature themes). 89 minutes. Directed by Steven Quale. Screenplay by John
Swetnam.
Verdict: Sound and
fury signifying nothing.
Anyone with fond
memories of Jan de Bont’s ground-breaking Twister (1996), or any other film
that focuses on the impacts of extreme weather events, will find Quale’s (Final
Destination 5) offering almost instantly forgettable. While the sound and
visual effects are great, the film lacks the necessary menace that these kinds
of ‘Mother Nature as fiercely unforgiving adversary’ films need in order to
sustain our interest in the scenes of relentless destruction and devastation.
In the
all-American town of Silverton, everyone’s a film-maker. As the townsfolk brace
for an epic series of tornado touch-downs, the hapless cast run around with a
dazzling array of smartphones and video cameras filming anyone and anything
that will stay still long enough.
Quale and Swetnam’s
miscalculation is that unlike the hand-held camera found-footage masterpieces
Blair Witch Project (1999) and Cloverfield (2008), the secret to the dramatic
success of this particular style of film-making is as much about what we don’t
see as what we do. Donnie (Max Deacon) and the love of his life Kaitlyn’s (Alycia
Debnam Carey) near-death video messages from within a flooded paper-mill, for
example, are nothing compared to the famous camper’s video diary sequence from
Blair Witch Project.
The competent cast
of bland lead characters is also frequently upstaged, hilariously, by two
Jackass-inspired locals who are desperate for their five minutes of YouTube
fame. The scene involving their family swimming pool and their furious mother
is an absolute highlight, which is bizarre given how it is the least expensive
sequence in what is obviously a massive effects budget extravaganza. Had Into
the Storm managed to generate at least one more original idea, it might have
been a good deal more interesting than it is.
This review was
commissioned by the West Australian Newspaper Group.
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