Metascore
68 out of 100

Generally favorable reviews - based on 17 Critics

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 12 out of 17
  2. Negative: 1 out of 17
  1. It's hard to dislike a picture with flying cows and oil trucks.
  2. 89
    It's a keeper, a tumultuous love story set against the backdrop of 24 hours of really, really inclement weather in the Oklahoma heartland.
  3. Reviewed by: Mike Clark
    88
    A summer crowd-pleaser worthy of its wind.
  4. Reviewed by: Ian Nathan
    80
    This film encompasses everything that is both grating and great about the blockbuster. It gives scant regard to character depth or dialogue while still being a must-see hoopla of computer trickery that weakens the knees and raises the neck-hairs.
  5. Perhaps the greatest compliment that can be paid to the rush of raw excitement "Twister" creates is that it makes it possible to ignore the painful awkwardness of the film's expository sequences and thudding dialogue of the "OK, boss lady, hold your horses" variety.
  6. Hurtling pace, by-the-numbers character development and exotic science. Tornado-chasing suddenly takes on a sex appeal not usually associated with horrendous storms.
  7. Twister is full of marvelous special effects. The story exists only to provide some respite between those marvels, like dialogue in an opera full of terrific arias. [10 June 1996, p.24]
  8. 75
    Doesn't have any pretensions. It is what it sets out to be: an effective piece of big money, early summer entertainment designed to blow viewers away.
  9. And for a movie that stars acts of God, this work of mortals provides surprisingly little liftoff. The stuff that whips through the angry skies in Twister is the most exciting part of the spectacle. Essentially, we're turned on by debris.
  10. Reviewed by: Todd McCarthy
    70
    Another theme park ride of a movie without an ounce of emotional credibility to it, Twister succeeds on its own terms by taking the audience somewhere it has never been before: into a tornado's funnel.
  11. The engineering of the special effects is fairly impressive, and the sight of so many objects and creatures being buffeted about carries a certain apocalyptic splendor.
  12. 63
    You want loud, dumb, skillful, escapist entertainment? Twister works. You want to think? Think twice about seeing it.
  13. Reviewed by: Staff (Not Credited)
    60
    Extreme-weather buffs, thrill-ride junkies and anyone else in search of mindless entertainment need look no further.
  14. Audiences may howl at the hackneyed plot and dialogue, but you won't hear them over the Dolby sound effects assaulting your eardrums at a gazillion decibels.
  15. The scenes of destruction-apart from being great to watch-provide much-needed relief from these people's unidimensional banalities.
  16. 40
    Twister not only blows, it sucks, too.
  17. Big swirls of computer-generated dirt, a bickering couple and the dead certainty that the fiancee will leave and the bickerers will get back together. An exciting night out, or what?
User Score

Generally favorable reviews- based on 25 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 7 out of 10
  2. Negative: 1 out of 10
  1. May well be the best film ever made, everything about it is amazing you love storms or tornadoes then twister is for you! also the special effects in this film are superb outstanding and still show up well today despite the film being made in 1996 Full Review »
  2. j30
    5
    Aw the good old Jan de Bont days filed with good special effects and well not much else. First Speed (pretty awesome), then Twister (pretty OK), then Speed: Cruise Control (oh God no), then The Haunting (make it stop!), then finally Lara Croft (I've lost faith in humanity). That pretty much sums it up right there. Full Review »
  3. Cut out the special effects in this movie and your left with actors who give the most annoying performances of their careers and a preposterously ridiculous predictable plot. This movie may be watchable but people who say its good need to get their heads checked. Twister is mediocre save for the special effects. Pass. Full Review »