‘Twister’ Spawns a Tornado Watch

Tornado season officially begins today with the theatrical release of “Twister.” To video suppliers, this dark cloud has a potential silver lining. Distributors are rushing back to nature in anticipation of the excitement generated by what has been forecast to be one of this year’s biggest box-office hits.

Things started early with “Tornado!,” a preemptive made-for-Fox movie broadcast this week. The movie was seen in about 9.8 million homes--about twice as many as Fox normally gets with its Tuesday movies.

The dust-up continues in video stores, where the growth of the special-interest video market has distributors and retailers constantly scouring the horizon for ancillary marketing opportunities. Dinosaur videos were the rage after the release of “Jurassic Park.” ’Apollo 13” launched a spate of space-based documentaries.

“We look for links,” said Peter Busch, vice president of video merchandising for the Musicland Group Inc., which includes the sell-through Suncoast chain. “Whenever a movie comes out that is about a subject with cross-over potential for video, we like to take advantage.”

“We’re certainly buying a number of [tornado videos],” said John Thrasher, vice president of video purchasing and distribution for Tower Video. “People are interested in natural phenomena [because] of the sheer, awesome power. There are great documentaries about what creates them that are suitable for all ages.”

One of the most popular tornado videos already on the market is the 90-minute “Twisters: Nature’s Fury,” a two-volume set on the Goldhil label that carries a suggested retail price of $14.98. Released last March, it has shipped an estimated 75,000 copies.

The first tape follows the work of storm chasers. The second features “up close and personal” footage shot by amateurs who, Goldhil Chairman Dwight Hilson says, “happen to be in the right place at the wrong time, or, if you will, the wrong place at the right time.” In one sequence, a man emerges from his basement to discover a tornado has ravaged his house.

“This is pretty mesmerizing, intense stuff,” Busch said. “We play it on our in-store systems and it stops people dead in their tracks.”

Another video getting a lift from “Twister” is “Tornadoes!! The Entity,” distributed by Victory Multimedia, (310) 416-9140, Ext. 273. It retails for $19.95 and is available in a narrated version or with an instrumental soundtrack.

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In essence, a tornado is the most compelling of screen villains in its frightening size and, with interior winds of 300 mph, humbling power. “A tornado is the beast that you imagine in a horror movie come to life,” “Entity” producer Norman Beerger said.

Spanning 40 years, this hourlong program boasts footage of 46 tornadoes culled from home movies and scientific and news organizations. Harrowing highlights include nine minutes of footage from the 1991 Andover, Kan., tornado that killed 20 people and caused more than $222 million in damage. The storm comes within 100 yards of the photographer.

Beerger, a longtime storm chaser, filmed a rare desert tornado outside of Las Vegas. “I was yelling and screaming like a kid going on a roller coaster for the first time,” he said.

A&E; Home Video, (800) 423-1212, has re-priced “Tornado Chasers,” the first in its “Power of Nature” series, to $14.95. Filmed at “Tornado Alley” in Oklahoma, this program focuses on the research conducted by storm chasers.

Witness some of the worst tornadoes of the last decade in “Tornado!,” an episode from the PBS series “Nova,” available on the WGBH label for $19.95.

There is more stormy weather ahead. Chicago-based MPI Home Video, (800) 323-0442, will ship “Savage Skies” the week of May 20, less than two weeks after the conclusion of its broadcast on PBS. NBC meteorologist Al Roker narrates this four-part series that comprises awesome images and harrowing first-person accounts of too-close encounters with floods (“Fire and Rain”), tornadoes and lightning (“Riders on the Storm”), hurricanes (“Monsters of the Deep”) and perpetual ice and snow (“The Winter’s Tale”).

Each volume will retail for $19.98, or $79.98 for a boxed set.

MPI also distributes “Tornadoes,” an episode from the “Secrets of the Unknown” series hosted by Edward Mulhare, for $14.98 retail.

National Geographic Video, distributed by Columbia TriStar Home Video, will be in stores May 28 with “Nature’s Fury,” which explores the cataclysmic impact of earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes and floods, and “Cyclone!” Each will retail for $19.95.

And if ever a wonderful twister there was, a further programming note: “The Wizard of Oz” has its annual broadcast tonight on CBS.