It is a busy year for John Maclean. After a 21 year gap, The Beta Band are reforming for a tour to play their classic The Three EPs album across a range of venues in September and October. John will be joining them for the tour, which has been a welcome surprise for fans of the band.
Not happy with just one return after a long break, Maclean is also returning to cinemas with period samurai drama Tornado, his first feature film since 2015’s Slow West. It has been a long time in the making, with stoppages caused by the Covid pandemic and the writers’ strikes, but it was absolutely worth the wait.
Tornado’s opening immediately draws the viewer in. A mysterious girl runs across an open grassy plain, hotly pursued by a young boy and then a gang of mercenaries. The shot is reminiscent of the opening of Star Wars (1977) – you know the smaller characters are in trouble and you want to find out why. Hiding in a forest, before taking refuge in a country house, the girl watches on as she realises the gang are moments away from finding her.
This girl is the titular Tornado, portrayed wonderfully by the Tokyo-born actress Kōki, a relative newcomer who takes centre stage throughout the film. As the daughter of actor Takuya Kimura (Blade of the Immortal) she is clearly well-versed in the art of samurai swordsmanship, but the role calls for much more than just swinging a sword. Indeed, that doesn’t really become relevant until the final third of the film, then the action ramps up.
Elsewhere, Tim Roth and Jack Lowden provide an intriguing father-son relationship as their bickering threatens to cause a rupture in the close-knot gang they are part of. Joanne Whalley, Takehiro Hira and Rory McCann all feature capably in supporting roles.
Visually, Tornado is a beauty to behold. Shot on 35mm cameras on a low budget, Maclean and cinematographer Robbie Ryan (The Favourite, Poor Things, Slow West) clearly have an eye for cinematic beauty. It was surely a risk to take film on a punishing January shoot in Scotland, with only 25 days to capture the entire film, but it absolutely pays off.
It’s a great time for British film, with The Ballad of Wallis Island also proving to be popular and critically celebrated. The films couldn’t be more different in tone, but both deserve to be sought out.
Cinema, etc. 