It’s usually at the end of the review that I talk about a film’s MPAA rating, but I’ll twist it up for “Twisters.” Or rather, for its 1996 predecessor “Twister” and its all-time terribly-worded rating justification. The film was rated PG-13 for “intense depiction of very bad weather.” Yes, the depiction was intense, and yes, the weather was very, very bad, but those twisters were so violent and destructive that “weather” seems like the wrong word to describe them. They may as well have used the term “extreme windiness.” The twisters are similarly violent and destructive in “Twisters,” which is much more sensibly rated PG-13 for “intense action and peril, some language and injury images.”

The new film stars Daisy Edgar-Jones as Kate and Glen Powell as Tyler, two storm chasers with different reasons for traveling Oklahoma looking for tornadoes. She’s trying to set up a 3-D mapping system that will help scientists understand how tornadoes form and thus save lives. She used to think she could rig up a chemical reaction that could actually stop a fully-formed tornado, but a field test in the film’s opening moments turns deadly, so she has to settle for the mapping system endorsed by her old friend Javi (Anthony Ramos). Tyler wants to shoot fireworks into a tornado to make a cool visual that gets him subscribers on Youtube and increase his celebrity so he can sell tacky merchandise. Kate is glad to have the moral high ground, or so she thinks.

As the film progresses, Tyler shows he has more layers than Kate initially thought. He’s a learned meteorologist and a big-hearted humanitarian. It also turns out that Kate may have jumped on the wrong bandwagon. She and Javi are noble, but their team’s sponsor isn’t. Kate and Tyler find that they like chasing the storms together, helping recovery efforts together, and just plain spending time together. Cute squabbling turns to cute flirting. Please tell me it’s not much of a spoiler to find out that there’s romantic chemistry between the smoldering cowboy and the beautiful scientist.

Then there are the twister sequences themselves. I used to be terrified of tornadoes, but the fear mostly dropped off when I hit my teens. This movie may rekindle some of that fear, especially after the opening sequence. The rest of the sequences are fine. I was never unconvinced that there was danger afoot. One thing I knew going in was that twisters, while they can form quickly, don’t lend themselves to jump scares, so I was wondering what the film would have to do to push my buttons that way. There are two effective jump scares that made me scream for half a second and then laugh for several full ones.

You can probably guess the kind of experience that “Twisters” provides. It’s a PG-13 disaster movie. The action scenes, while fraught with mortal danger, aren’t going to feature anyone getting ripped limb from limb. The comedic and romantic scenes are perfectly predictable as well, with Edger-Jones and Powell having the pleasing chemistry I knew they’d have. Of the characters that survive among Kate, Tyler, Javi, and Tyler’s colorful team, I wouldn’t mind seeing these characters in more movies. I’m sure the filmmakers can come up with more creative storm scenarios. For now, this was exactly the movie I expected it to be, but I had a reasonably good time watching very bad weather.

Grade: B-

“Twisters” is rated PG-13 for intense action and peril, some language and injury images. Its running time is 117 minutes.

Contact Bob Garver at rrg251@nyu.edu.

Cast: Mark Wahlberg, Simu Liu, Nathalie Emmanuel

Director: Simon Cellan-Jones

Language: English

Animals are not merely equal to humans, sometimes their resistance ends up being far superior and far more rousing for us to witness as audiences in cinema. We recently saw the apes protecting their planet, what belonged to them. We wept when the adorable pet Hachiko waited for its master to come back even when we knew he would never. And then there are creatures that turn into monsters that revel in galloping their prey in the most hideous and monstrous of visuals. Think of Jaws, Jurassic Park, Anaconda. Films that can still send a chill down the spine.

We now get Arthur The King, where it’s a dog who’s the King and not its master, played by Mark Wahlberg. So what is the film all about? In 2015, in Costa Rica, Michael Light, an American runner, and his adventure racing team gets stuck on the first day after their leader takes the poor decision to kayak against the tide. Leo, one of the members of the team, is outraged that Michael has not paid attention to their opinions. This is how Wikipedia has described one half of the plot. The rest is mystery for those who would choose to watch the film now available on Lionsgate.

The visuals are stunning and the film keeps you on the edge of your seats. Cinematographer Jacques Jouffret sucks you in the world he shoots and handled ably by Simon Jones, the director. The dog, no, the king does a fine job of doing what these creatures do best- share a loyal chemistry with their master and save lives when needed. And since this is a film filled with some thunderous adventure, there comes an opportunity when Arthur literally puts his life to allow others in this game of life and death to survive.

It says a lot about where humanity is heading when you constantly root for animals more than humans. Okay, not to mention those creature features again where humans were being wiped out at the speed of light. But here, you root for the canine from the word go. And the director shoots their scenes with care and attention. Humans can fumble when it comes to acting, but infants and animals are the most natural and effortless, acting or not. The more they are not acting, the more they are. And the better for the film. And Arthur The King is no exception. A theatrical experience would have been much better since the film boasts off some adrenaline pumping action choreography and impressive visuals, a small screen won’t harm either. By the end, Arthur would have stolen the show, size of the screen notwithstanding.

Rating: 3 (out of 5 stars)

Arthur The King is now streaming on Lionsgate

Westwood’s historic movie palaces, the Regency Village Theatre and the Bruin, are closing later this week.

“The last day of operation for the Bruin & Village Theaters under Regency is Thursday, July 25^{,” Lyndon Golin, Regency Theatres president, confirmed in an email Sunday.}

Regency has managed the two theaters for 14 years, but its leases for the properties end later this month, Golin added.

A beloved landmark, the Village Theatre is expected to close only temporarily, thanks to a high-profile effort by director Jason Reitman and others to save the once stately 170-foot white Spanish Revival-Art Deco “wedding cake” tower that has beckoned Westside moviegoers since 1931. The group announced in late February that its acquisition of the theater had closed but it did not disclose a timetable for renovations or say when the Village might be ready for a grand re-opening.

The fate of the nearby Bruin, which opened in 1937, remains unclear; it was not purchased along with its more showy sibling.

“The [Bruin’s] owners thank the Golin Family and Regency Theaters for our relationship with them for the last 14 years,” the family said in a statement, provided by a representative. The owners said they are “currently evaluating future opportunities for the Bruin.”

Long known as the Fox Westwood Village, the theater was designated a historic cultural monument in 1988.

Famously used as a location in Quentin Tarantino’s 1960s-set “Once Upon a Time … in Hollywood,” the venue, designed by Percy P. Lewis, originally was part of the Fox theater chain. In the 1970s, it became part of the Mann Theatres chain.

The theater went on the market last year. After learning the news, Reitman raced to stitch together a group of filmmakers to purchase the venue before it could be turned into a retail shop or another business serving the nearby UCLA community.

Plans include gussying up the Village — which has a 70mm-capable screen, an upgraded sound system and a cavernous auditorium that can seat more than 1,300 people — to eventually screen a mixture of first-run films and repertory programming, the new owners have said.

“We have an exciting vision that includes dining, drinking, moviegoing, gallery viewing and programming of new and old films, and we cannot wait to share that with everybody,” Reitman said in a February interview with The Times.

Representatives of Reitman‘s group did not respond to queries Sunday for additional details.

The effort to save the Village Theatre on Broxton Avenue came as movie houses in Los Angeles and elsewhere in the country were struggling to stay afloat following the devastating one-two punch of COVID-19 pandemic-related closures and last year’s strikes by Hollywood writers and actors.

The film pipeline has been slow to return, hampering the comeback hopes of many movie theater operators.

Some did not survive the pandemic, including the ArcLight Cinemas chain, with six locations in the Los Angeles area, and the Landmark Theatres’ location at Westside Pavillion.

Still, there have been flickers of a rebound with the success of recent Hollywood blockbusters, including this weekend’s “Twisters,” from Universal Pictures, which racked up more than $80 million in domestic ticket sales in its debut. Disney/Pixar’s “Inside Out 2,” also has soared, generating an estimated $1.4 billion in global sales since its June opening.

Others have shown faith in the independent moviegoing scene. Four years ago, Netflix purchased the Egyptian Theatre in Hollywood; filmmaker Tarantino bought the historic Vista Theater in Los Feliz in 2021; and Sony Pictures Entertainment last month assumed control of the Texas-based Alamo Drafthouse Cinema chain, including its location in downtown L.A.

Reitman’s group includes a dizzying array of Oscar-winning filmmakers and other talent, including Christopher Nolan, J.J. Abrams, Guillermo del Toro, Christopher McQuarrie, Judd Apatow, Damien Chazelle, Steven Spielberg, Chris Columbus, Bradley Cooper, Alfonso Cuarón, Hannah Fidell, Alejandro González Iñárritu, James Gunn and Rian Johnson. Other announced members of the ownership group include Gil Kenan, Karyn Kusama, Justin Lin, Phil Lord, David Lowery, Chris Miller, Todd Phillips, Gina Prince-Bythewood, Jay Roach, Seth Rogen, Emma Seligman, Emma Thomas, Denis Villeneuve, Lulu Wang and Chloé Zhao.

Through Thursday, “Twisters” is playing at the Bruin, and “Fly Me to the Moon” is screening at the Village, according to Regency’s website. Regency Theatres operates 20 locations, primarily in Southern California.

This is a developing story.

Staff writer Josh Rottenberg contributed to this report.