Tornadoes and heavy CGI devastation. “Into the Storm” put all of its eggs (and money) into that basket and hoped it was enough to win an audience. With a budget of $50 million and a box office take of $160 million I would say the movie more than accomplished its goal. Less discerning fans will leave satisfied with the numerous twisters and their swirls of dirt and debris. But if you happen to be looking for anything more than that “Into the Storm” will leave you wanting.
The story follows a couple of groups in and around the small town of Silverton, Oklahoma. One is a group of storm chasers led by Pete (Matt Walsh). He is a veteran chaser who is also working on a documentary, but the storms haven’t been good to him. He’s desperate to track down a tornado and he has brought in meteorologist Allison Stone (Sarah Wayne Callies) to help. She’s on a short leash especially after missing a recent storm and costing Pete some good footage. Pete reluctantly follows Allison’s storm tracker hunch and they head to Silverton.
In Silverton school vice-principal Gary Fuller (Richard Armitage) is a widower and father of two high school boys. Donnie (Max Deacon) is his more quiet and reserved son. Trey (Nathan Cress) is his more obnoxious younger brother. Neither have had the best or most open relationship with their father since their mother died. It won’t help matters that Donnie shirks his duties of filming a graduation ceremony to help the girl of his dreams with her video school project.
As you can guess a massive storm front comes through spawning a number of tornadoes in Silverton. The movie takes us back and forth between our two groups as they encounter one destructive twister after another. Eventually both groups come together and must survive the queen mother of all tornadoes. I know this is true because one character actually says something like “It’s the biggest tornado ever”. This movie does that a lot. We aren’t allowed to glean information for ourselves. Everything is spelled out for us. Also don’t expect to find interesting and compelling characters. Everyone feels unoriginal and scripted. But to be fair plot, dialogue, and character development aren’t priorities here.
“Into the Storm” partially redeems itself with its visual presentation. It’s hard not to be impressed with the CGI twisters blowing down trees, tearing through buildings, and slinging 18 wheelers like footballs. The special effects are thrilling, well conceived, and very satisfying. Clearly a huge hunk of the budget went towards the visuals and that’s okay. Most people will see the movie for Mother Nature’s spectacle and it doesn’t disappoint. The only thing that hampers the looks of the film was the decision to go the found-footage route. It’s implementation is clunky, annoying, and quite frankly I’m tired of the gimmick.
At a brisk 89 minutes “Into the Storm” doesn’t exhaust its welcome. It aims for one rather uninspired target and for the most part it hits it. In that regard I had fun with it. But the overly familiar characters, the bland and sometimes silly dialogue, and the plot’s lack of any originality whatsoever makes this just another run-of-the-mill disaster movie. And this leads me to a question: Can we not have a smart and engaging weather based disaster flick? I don’t know, maybe rain, wind, and intelligent creative writing don’t mix.
Keith & the Movies 
Hmm never really felt too inclined to check this one out. You just confirmed that it’s exactly what I thought it would be.
If you run across it on USA Network some night it may be worth watching. But then again… Maybe not.
Haha fair enough
Good review. Of course there can be good weather-based disaster movie. We just have to be patient.
Patient indeed! 🙂
Never saw this one, but seems I haven’t missed to much. Recently saw San Andreas and one disaster movie for now is enough.
This one wouldn’t do much for you. I assure you of that! 😉
Interesting you posted this today…I have the same movie review ready to post this week. I enjoyed the movie, but there isn’t anything special that stands out about it. I certainly agree that it would be nice to have a more engaging plot, and basically said the same thing in my own review, just in other words. Great review!
That is interesting. I actually wrote this in January and suddenly realized I hadn’t posted it yet. It does have its fun moments but for me just not enough of them.
Truthfully, I got a kick out of the film. Great visuals, and it’s nice to see Richard Armitage doing something other than wielding a sword or axe and wearing a beard. Between this and Twister, Twister is the better film, but this one starts off running, and is pretty simple.
I can definitely see where someone could have fun with it. I mean I had some fun as well. That’s why I didn’t really come down on it. But there are just a few too many dumb scenes and an interesting characters that make this a very throw-away movie for me.
Nope, still not sold on this one hahaha!
LOL! I promise you, you will be okay if you skip out. 🙂
Hey! Where did that international airport come from in the middle of small town nowhere? One of the film’s many problems including the apparent abandoning of the self filmed/found footage element when it didn’t suit the action. Overall the acting was pretty good (if you exclude the two red necks/Jackass wannabes introduced as some sort of humerous foil).
The acting was pretty good as a whole although they weren’t given much to work with. And you’re right, there are many goofy inconsistencies.
Ahah, you’re actually more generous than me on this one Keith. I like Richard Armitage but what the heck is he doing in this crappola??! $160 million? Wow I didn’t know it made THAT much. It’s a dumber version of Twister really, I mean it’s excruciatingly bad. Ahah your last line is spot on there.
I think if it would have gone 90 minutes or longer I would have checked out. Thankfully it ended pretty quick. Still not enough to fully cover the numerous flaws though.
Love that last thought there Keith. I’m inclined to think us weather-related disaster flick geeks are doomed to be served subpar stuff like this for eternity. Aside from Twister, I can’t remember one that’s been really good.
And I have always had fun with ‘disaster’ pictures. I think that’s why this one at least scored a 2.5. There are moments that work. But then there is the rest of it. 😉