Into The Storm

Into The Storm, the latest movie from director Steven Quale is at times a rip roaring roller coaster of a movie. The other times it's a tired melodrama that slows the pace down considerably. Thankfully the roller coaster ride is more of what you get with Into The Storm and because of that I give it three buckets of Killer Korn.












This is Steven Quale's second full length feature film, his first being Final Destination 5. I have no idea if that movie was good or bad and quite frankly I didn't care who directed Into The Storm because they trailer had me at "storm". Let me explain, deep, deep, deep inside me lives this guy who loves storms and get's giddy when there's thunder shaking the buildings and lightning blazing across the skies. He is too small however to compel me to go storm chasing (I shout his behind down every time he brings it up). So when I saw this trailer I was all in, director be damned which is very unlike me but when I saw those jets getting swept up in a F5 tornado, an F5 wouldn't have kept me away. Okay, maybe an F5 would have, but if it were an F3 I would have been there munching on my popcorn and having a great time buddy.

Made for a scant $50 million dollars, Storm should have no problem making that money back and then some at the box office. There are no big names in the film and the cast holds only two really familiar faces. Sarah Wayne Callies who played Lori in The Walking Dead plays Allison, a women with a PhD in meteorology and Scott Lawrence who's a consummate character actor that's been in pretty much everything plays Principal Walker. Richard Armitage who is a good actor in his own right but hasn't done many movies plays Gary, a widower with two young boys under his care. The rest of the cast is comprised of mainly TV actors so they came relatively cheap which is good. You can't have a film called Into The Storm and have a weak looking storm so the money they saved on casting went towards the jaw dropping special effects. So don't go in expecting Shakespeare like performances and you'll be fine. Oh, and this movie is NOT a remake of the 1996 movie Twister, just letting you know.

The plot is a simple one written by John Swetnam, never before seen weather patterns are converging on a small Oklahoma town during high school graduation. Tornadoes touch down and wreak havoc while boy and girl struggle to stay alive in abandoned building before determined dad can save them as he dodges twister after twister. The big moment though is when an F5 forms and touches down, that's when the jaw drops and everything in it's path is destroyed. Yep, I'll admit it, I was giddy. Into The Storm is a pure popcorn summer movie that was far better than Guardians of the Galaxy could ever hope to be on less than half the budget. Think about that if you see it and imagine what could have been had Storm possessed the kind of budget Guardians did and vice versa. Check out Storm, you won't be sorry and I'll see you at the theater!