The Filmmakers

In the heartland of America, the sky is a majestic wonder as it rises infinitely above the vast, level horizon. Cloud formations gracefully soar and scuttle across the endlessness of blue. Gentle spring breezes whisper across the plains. All elements blend together in a delicate choreography of elegant balance and awesome design.
But the sky sometimes changes.
Serene blue bruises into an angry, electric green, and the cumulus clouds flatten and spread into a roiling canvas hanging low above the plains. Kettle drums of thunder tremble, lightning streaks and raindrops harden into pellets of hail. All are parts of a violent prelude to the most mysterious and deadly form nature can take -- a tornado, the swirling, screaming spiral of destruction that drops from the sky and obliterates everything that stands in its random, terrible path.
For most, the threat of a tornado sends them searching for safe shelter -- into storm cellars or closets, hoping the killer will spare them in its mindless trail of devastation. But there are a few who purposefully put themselves directly in the route of the massive rampager. Their hearts race with the adrenaline of the chase as they speed towards the monstrous cyclones -- led by their instinct -- in order to face them, understand them and someday harness their unpredictable behavior into understandable patterns. These few risk their lives as they track their elusive quarry, killer tornadoes which sometimes seem to chase them right back as they tear across the countryside.
JAN DE BONT, who made his triumphant directorial debut with the smash action hit "Speed" after years as an accomplished director of photography on such action blockbusters as "Die Hard," "The Hunt for Red October" and "Lethal Weapon 3," brings moviegoers face-to-face with the most breathtaking and catastrophic terrors of nature in the thrilling new action-adventure, "Twister."
"Twister" joins together some of the film industry's most successful talents who, individually and collaboratively, have been responsible for some of the screen's most unforgettable spectacles. The film is written by MICHAEL CRICHTON & ANNE-MARIE MARTIN. Crichton's many best-selling novels have been the creative origin of such big-screen smashes as "Jurassic Park" and "Congo," and he is the creator and executive producer of television's runaway hit series, "ER."
Crichton is also a producer of "Twister," along with KATHLEEN KENNEDY, whose credits include the two biggest hits in the history of cinema -- "Jurassic Park" and "E.T. The Extra Terrestrial" -- and IAN BRYCE, who collaborated previously with De Bont on "Speed" and was part of the teams behind "Batman Returns" and "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade."
Academy Award-winning director and producer STEVEN SPIELBERG -- who recently enjoyed double pinnacles of his extraordinary and celebrated film career with "Schindler's List" and "Jurassic Park" and who counts "Jaws," "E.T. The Extra Terrestrial," "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" among his staggering list of credits -- is one of the executive producers of "Twister," along with his colleagues at Amblin Entertainment, WALTER PARKES, LAURIE MACDONALD and GERALD R. MOLEN.
Leading the cast of "Twister" are Helen Hunt, the acclaimed star of televison's hit comedy "Mad About You," and BILL PAXTON, who soared as one of the astronauts in last year's stirring adventure, "Apollo 13." They star as Jo and Bill Harding, a couple on the brink of divorce who find themselves thrown together again for one last death-defying chase across the plains of Oklahoma. They are joined by CARY ELWES ("The Princess Bride") and JAMI GERTZ ("The Lost Boys").
To bring the film's amazing vision to full cinematic life, the filmmakers assembled a superlative team of creative talents.
The director of photography is JACK N. GREEN, who was nominated for an Academy Award for his uncompromising imagery of the American West in "Unforgiven" and recently collaborated again with director Clint Eastwood on "The Bridges of Madison County." The production was designed by JOSEPH NEMEC III, whose credits include "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" and "Patriot Games." Nemec and his team worked on location in Oklahoma and Iowa, using the characteristic landscapes and small-town charms of the real "Tornado Alley" in visualizing the tornado-plagued plains of "Twister." MICHAEL KAHN is the editor, whose work on "Raiders of the Lost Ark" and "Schindler's List" won him Oscars and whose experience includes "Close Encounters of the Third Kind" and "Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom." The composer is MARK MANCINA, whose driving scores have helped propel the action in "Speed" and "Assassins."
Other notable talents on the "Twister" team include special-effects supervisor JOHN FRAZIER, who had to re-create the massive destruction of one of nature's most powerful forces, which included constructing and demolishing an entire town, tumbling an exploding tractor trailer down a highway, conjuring a furious hail storm out of nothing and dropping a full-size house.
Digital effects were accomplished by the superlative team at Industrial Light and Magic, who reanimated dinosaurs in "Jurassic Park," placed "Forrest Gump" in the company of long-deceased presidents and heralded the arrival of morphing technology in "Terminator 2: Judgment Day." Their computer wizardry was supplemented by actual footage shot by a special crew of storm chasers who mirrored their on-screen counterparts in tracking tornadoes across the Midwest.
"Twister" is an Amblin Entertainment production released domestically by Warner Bros. and internationally by Universal Pictures.

Production Notes		About the Cast

Movie Trailer | Production Notes | Cast Notes
The Filmmakers | Movie Photos