Tornado: Atrapados en la tormenta

Your enjoyment of this documentary of the historic tornado in Joplin will largely depend on whether you prefer more personal stories with amateur shaky footage or if you would rather see a glossy production with lots of expert talking heads and raw data. I tend to prefer the former because it takes a massive event and scales it down to the personal level which to me is much more powerful. I can relate much more to individual experiences compared to boring discussions of weather patterns and historic precedent

I'm not sure why they picked these individual stories to tell. Almost all the accounts are from people that were teenagers at the time, but I think it was a good choice. When you are that age big events like this can completely alter your outlook on life and the future. I wasn't equally interested in all the accounts, but it gave the story a decidedly emotional element that would be missing from many documentaries

The footage is chaotic and a lot of it is just cameras pointing at the sky with no particular focus on the tornado, but it highlights the chaotic nature of the event and helps build tension. You won't see a lot of footage of the tornado ripping through houses or CGI reenactments of its path, but it goes along with the personal nature of this story as a lot of the footage was taken by those being interviewed or camera footage from the areas they were at

However, it could have used a little more context information. It really didn't accurately portray the sheer devastation and destruction of the town. Most of the time is spent building up to the tornado and the moments during with very little time spent on the aftermath. There are no maps showing its path or any overhead shots of the whole town with the line cut through it, so it's a little hard to put the whole thing in perspective for someone not familiar with the area

Ultimately, I got unusually emotional watching it which is my sign that it worked. Many documentaries explain everything in a clinical way with lots of facts and talking heads, which can be good, but I tend to prefer these more intimate stories that I can connect to on a personal level.