‘Tornado’ review: Tim Roth, Jack Lowden and Kôki do battle in 18th century Britain

Dir/scr: John Maclean. UK. 2025. 91mins

In the unforgiving landscape of 1790s Britain, daily survival is already something of a lottery. But throw some stolen gold, a clan of blood-thirsty outlaws and a Japanese samurai into the mix, and the stakes get a whole lot higher. Scottish director John Maclean’s ambitious second feature is an intriguing blend of Western and samurai actioner — always close bedfellows — which makes the most of its untamed setting.

 Unfussy and atmospheric work

Opening the Glasgow Film Festival, Tornado comes a decade after Maclean’s Slow West, and shares its Western framework and heavy, fatalistic atmosphere. Tornado may not have quite the dramatic or casting heft of its predecessor, which starred Michael Fassbender, but it should find an appreciative domestic audience when it releases in the UK in May through Lionsgate. It has also sold to a raft of international territories, including North America (IFC/Shudder) although prospects there may differ.

Gorgeous cinematography from Robbie Ryan (returning from Slow West and Maclean’s 2009 short Pitch Black Heist) immediately drinks in the foreboding beauty of this empty, expansive landscape. On-screen captioning indicates Tornado is set in the ‘British Isles’, and it shot in Scotland, while accents run the gamut of the UK and beyond. Across this vista runs a clearly terrified young Japanese woman, trailed by a small boy and, behind them, a gang of armed men.

After an establishing set-up which reveals that the men are looking for some stolen gold, the film then jumps back to the beginning of the day, as 16-year-old Tornado (Japanese actress and model Kôki, from Baltasar Kormakur’s Touch) is admonished by her father Fujin (Takehiro Hara, Shogun and Girl/Haji) for not taking her duties seriously. Following the death of her European mother, Tornado reluctantly assists Fujin — formerly a samurai master — in his travelling puppet show; something that puts her in the fateful path of both the gold and the vicious gang led by Sugarman (a grizzly Tim Roth), who run roughshod over the local area.

As the embittered Sugarman, his belligerent son Little Sugar (Slow Horses star Jack Lowden working with a thinly-sketched character) and gang hunt down Tornado and the loot, the action feels somewhat stuck in a loop: they hunt her, they find her, they wreak some havoc, she escapes, and repeat. It all builds to an obvious, frenzied final-girl climax that feels tonally at odds with what has come before.

The real strength of Maclean’s lean screenplay lies in its observations of time and place. Much like the American West of the late 19th century, this is a land facing seismic change; the Industrial Revolution is looming, and centralised law and order is just around the corner. Sugarman and his ilk are a dying breed, desperately clinging on to power asserted through fear, aggression and a skewed idea of loyalty — which, for Sugarman, extends to his brutal relationship with his son.

Tornado and her father are also at odds, as she struggles to understand the traditions that mean so much to him, and rejects his efforts to pass them on. It goes without saying that, by the end of the day, Tornado will have a new perspective on her heritage, but Kôki is believable as a petulant teen finding the strength to live up to her name and become a force to be reckoned with.

Maclean has spent the decade since Slow West researching, writing and preparing Tornado and, while he wears his influences — Kurosawa, John Ford, Sergio Leone et al — proudly on his sleeve, the result is an authentic, multicultural period drama. This is a hardscrabble environment with no space for moral judgements or even notions of right and wrong; everyone is doing what they can to get by. Craft choices generally reflect this harsh reality: 35mm lensing brings a gritty texture, a muddy colour palette is largely devoid of warmth; costuming from Kirsty Halliday is practical and un-showy. Only the score, an east/west fusion from Jed Kurzel (Slow West, The Babadook), occasionally threatens to overwhelm what is otherwise an unfussy and atmospheric work.