Into the Storm (of Movie Nitpicking)

Yes, of course I went to see "Into the Storm" on opening night (actually the preview the night before). Did you really expect any less of me?

I thought it was a great movie. A lot of weather enthusiasts disagree, one of them was even the one jerk live tweeting during the movie, annoying his fellow moviegoers. Awesome.

A few observations about the movie and about the vitriol out there in the reviews. First, movies aren't supposed to be realistic. This is the chief mistake the critics seem to be making. To me, if it was about storm chasing, and it had some good effects, the movie did its job. And it did.

These are some of the same people who are holding "Twister" up an an example of an accurate movie. Have they seen "Twister" lately?

Secondly, it wasn't supposed to be scientifically accurate. Like Twister, however, it used most scientific words correctly, and the background screens showed real radar data.

Third, the movie was eerily topical; several things that happened in the movie preceded real life by only months -- a storm chaser being killed in a tornado (Tim Samaras, May 2013), school buses narrowly saving kids from a twister (March 2, 2012), to name only two. (The movie was filmed during the Summer of 2012 and received the green light on April 24, 2012, so it's possible that the latter was incorporated into the script).

In the end, it got a 6.2 on IMDB, which isn't great, but it's respectable. Twister maintains the same rating.