Twisters director Lee Isaac Chung has revealed his reasons for cutting a kiss scene at a pivotal point in the film.
Starring Daisy Edgar-Jones, Glen Powell, Anthony Ramos and more, the disaster film — a stand-alone sequel to the 1996 movie Twister — centres on a group of storm chasers trying to diffuse tornadoes with sodium polyacrylate solution.
It transpired that Edgar-Jones and Powell’s characters shared a kiss in one cut of the film, but it didn’t make it into the final edit. Set footage of the kiss went viral online in the days before Twisters arrived in cinemas, leaving fans disappointed to learn that it wasn’t in the final cut.
Speaking about the decision, Chung told Collider: “I have to say, I like both versions and there were many arguments made to have them kiss. My 13-year-old niece is very mad at me that I didn’t have them kiss because she saw that version and she loved that.
“But it feels to me that Kate’s journey and the reward at the end for her should not be a kiss, but that she’s found companionship, she’s found community again, and she’s also come back to her sense of purpose, which is chasing these storms. So a storm is coming in, and those two together decide to go out to chase that storm, and I love that ending. So, many apologies to my niece and other people.”
Edgar-Jones had previously told the outlet that the decision was also made after notes from executive producer Steven Spielberg came in and that she had agreed that the kiss should be cut.
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“I think it stops the film feeling too clichéd, actually,” she said [via Variety]. “I think there’s something really wonderful about it feeling like there’s a continuation. This isn’t the end of their story. They’re united by their shared passion for something.”
“I also think that this movie is not about them finding love,” Powell added. “It’s returning Kate [Edgar-Jones’ character] to the thing that she loves, which is storm chasing. So that’s what you have at the end of the movie. They share this thing, and her passion is reinvigorated, and her sense of home is reinvigorated.”
In a five-star review of Twisters, NME wrote: “The flick is also cleverly scripted, with Kate’s motivation slowly teased out as we learn she might just have the means of knocking the ‘nados into a cocked hat. The devastation wreaked by the freaky weather is evocatively explored and in this there’s a timely ecological message. Packed with heart, smarts, jaw-dropping effects and an exquisite ensemble cast (shout out to Harry Hadden-Paton’s nerdy British journalist as comic relief), Twisters will have you singing the praises of the multiplex until the cows come home.”
The film grossed $123million at the global box office in its opening weekend, making it the most successful weekend ever for a disaster movie.