Storm (1987 Film)
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''Storm'' is a 1987 Canadian
drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular ...
and first feature starring David Palffy and Stan Kane directed by
David Winning David Winning is a Canadian- American film and television director, screenwriter, producer, editor, and occasional actor. Although Winning has worked in numerous film and TV genres, his name is most commonly associated with science fiction, th ...
. The film was the debut of director Winning. Two college students on a survival weekend in the wilderness cross paths with three aging criminals looking for treasure buried decades earlier. Made in 24 days on a budget of about $70,000 CDN. The original 81-minute film was filmed near Bragg Creek, west of
Calgary Calgary () is a major city in the Canadian province of Alberta. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806 making it the third-largest city and fifth-largest metropolitan area in C ...
, in the summer of 1983, with an initial cast and crew of 10 people. It was released by
Warner Home Video Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment, Inc. (doing business as Warner Bros. Home Entertainment; formerly known as Warner Home Video and WCI Home Video and sometimes credited as Warner Home Entertainment) is the American home video distribution ...
on September 1, 1988. Director Winning appears in a small cameo as the younger villain.


Cast

* David Palffy as Lowell Stein * Stan Kane as Jim *Tom Schioler as Booker Lewis * Harry Freedman as Burt * Lawrence Elion as Stanley *Stacy Christensen as Cobi *James Hutchison as The Hostage *Sean O'Byrne as Danny


New version

23 minutes of additional material added in 1987 was requested by
The Cannon Group, Inc. The Cannon Group, Inc. was an American group of companies, including Cannon Films, which produced films from 1967 to 1994. The extensive group also owned, amongst others, a large international cinema chain and a video film company that investe ...
to bring the film up to feature-length for theatrical distribution in
Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...
and the
United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
. This addition met with mixed reviews as ''
The Globe and Mail ''The Globe and Mail'' is a Newspapers in Canada, Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in Western Canada, western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of more than 6 million in 2024, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on week ...
'' author Stephen Godfrey wrote in his “A Storm Warning” article. He said “the scenes are as refreshing as the rest of the film and show Winning’s talent for creating suspense and sympathy. But the structure of the film is now unbalanced; in its original form, Storm was an elaborate tease, a cat-and-mouse game that escalated gradually...” The new segments were filmed in the winter of January 1987 in Bragg Creek and Calgary, Alberta with the original cast.


Distribution and theatrical release

Storm was picked up by
Cannon Films The Cannon Group, Inc. was an American group of companies, including Cannon Films, which produced films from 1967 to 1994. The extensive group also owned, amongst others, a large international cinema chain and a video film company that investe ...
Cannon International for worldwide distribution in December 1986. The Canadian theatrical release was handled separately by Thomas Howe Associates of Vancouver, Canada with a premiere in Calgary November 26, 1987 followed by a Canadian theatrical run. Storm also ran theatrically in Los Angeles in December 1989 to qualify for the Academy Awards and was reviewed positively by the LA Times.


Reception

Kevin Thomas, of the ''
Los Angeles Times The ''Los Angeles Times'' is an American Newspaper#Daily, daily newspaper that began publishing in Los Angeles, California, in 1881. Based in the Greater Los Angeles city of El Segundo, California, El Segundo since 2018, it is the List of new ...
'' called the movie taut, ambitious and darkly comic in a 1989 review. He said the film worked very effectively as a comment on the male psyche and how lethal the mix of fear and aggression can be when men have a need to prove their masculinity for reasons imagined or real. ''
The Globe and Mail ''The Globe and Mail'' is a Newspapers in Canada, Canadian newspaper printed in five cities in Western Canada, western and central Canada. With a weekly readership of more than 6 million in 2024, it is Canada's most widely read newspaper on week ...
'' writer Jay Scott in an August 28, 1985 review called it a remarkable new thriller and a comic combination of Treasure of the Sierra Madre and
Deliverance ''Deliverance'' is a 1972 American thriller film directed and produced by John Boorman from a screenplay by James Dickey, who adapted it from his own Deliverance (novel), 1970 novel. It follows four businessmen from Atlanta who venture into th ...
. Peter Goddard of the ''
Toronto Star The ''Toronto Star'' is a Canadian English-language broadsheet daily newspaper. It is owned by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited, a subsidiary of Torstar Corporation and part of Torstar's Daily News Brands (Torstar), Daily News Brands division. ...
'' wrote Winning’s sense of movement within a scene is already masterly. He could make ice melting seem exciting. Fred Haeseker in a November 1987 ''
Calgary Herald The ''Calgary Herald'' is a daily newspaper published in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Publication began in 1883 as ''The Calgary Herald, Mining and Ranche Advocate, and General Advertiser''. It is owned by the Postmedia Network. History ''The C ...
'' review wrote that it’s a tongue-in-cheek pastiche of time-honored shock effects and rite-of-passage clichés, seen with a sense of humor that is usually missing from the pictures that spawned them.


References


External links

*
''Storm'' trailer
at
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{{David Winning 1987 films 1987 drama films Canadian drama films English-language Canadian films Films directed by David Winning Films scored by Amin Bhatia Films shot in Alberta Golan-Globus films 1987 directorial debut films 1980s English-language films 1980s Canadian films