Small Soldiers

Summary

Note: This review is solely of the film itself which I viewed digitally. The film has not yet received a stateside Blu-ray release, although there is a Region-B Blu-ray.

“Search out the Gorgonites and frag ‘em all!”

Joe Dante’s next project after The Second Civil War was a big budget film for Dreamworks Entertainment and Universal Pictures called Small Soldiers. Small Soldiers was one of the earliest pictures produced by DreamWorks and was made from a script by Gavin Scott, Adam Rifkin, Ted Elliott, and Terry Rossio. These writers have credits between them that include Pirates of the Caribbean, Aladdin, and Detroit Rock City. As a thirteen year old boy, I remember going to see the movie in the theaters as soon as it was released. The film did $87.5 million in its worldwide gross against a $40 million budget. The film also spawned numerous action figures and a video game. I recently revisited the film for the first time in two decades and was pleasantly surprised by how well it had aged.

The film begins at the headquarters for defense contractors Globotech Industries. The massive company has recently acquired a toy company. CEO Gil Miles (Denis Leary) meets with two toy designers – Larry Benson (Jay Mohr) and Irwin Wayfair (David Cross.) Irwin is an idealist and has created nonviolent toys called the Gorgonites that are designed to learn and teach children. Gil is immediately bored by this pitch. Larry is an opportunist and pitches his violent Commando Elite line of G.I.s. Gil sees an opportunity for something special and less boring – toys that play back. He envisions the Commando Elite as good guys who seek out and destroy the Gorgonites. He green lights the project for Irwin and Larry under this premise. Larry uses Irwin’s Globotech clearance to receive some extremely advanced chips for the toys, not realizing that they are advanced defense microchips. The toys are rolled out. Young Alan Abernathy (Gregory Smith) moonlights at his father’s toy store which takes a hard stance against violent toys. With his father away, Alan talks the delivery man, Joe (Dick Miller,) into allowing him to purchase an early shipment of the toys with the hope of selling the entire line before his father can return to the shop. Alan’s and Joe activate the two leaders of the toys – Chip Hazard (Tommy Lee Jones) and Archer (Frank Langella.) Alan’s biggest crush, Christy Fimple (Kirsten Dunst) swings by the store and purchases Chip Hazard for her little brother’s birthday present. When Alan gets home he realizes that Archer has stowed away in his bag. Meanwhile, back at the store the two factions have begun to fight and the Commando Elite have begun to destroy the Gorgonites. When Alan calls the company to complain, Larry and Irwin realize that the chips within the toys have made them sentient and potentially very dangerous. Chip Hazard turns himself on and rallies his troops to attempt to destroy all the Gorgonites and any person who gets in their way.

Small Soldiers has aged well. The film is comedically much more clever than I remembered from my childhood. The film features a bevy of great comedic talents – Jay Mohr, Phil Hartman, David Cross, and Denis Leary are all very funny in the film. The comedic performance that deserves the most attention is Tommy Lee Jones’ incredible voiceover work for Chip Hazard. His lines for the most part are designed to be a mishmash of every patriotic trope from the previous fifty years of Presidents and military leaders, but they are constructed together to never fully make sense. An example would be ,”damn the torpedoes, or give me death! Eternal vigilance is the price of duty.” Every line that Chip Hazard says in the film drew a laugh from me. The voice acting by Frank Langella is also very strong casting because Frank Langella has a great voice. I found it pretty cool that the rest of the commando elite are voiced by actors (with the exception of Bruce Dern) from The Dirty Dozen – Ernest Borgnine, Jim Brown, Clint Walker, George Kennedy, and Dick Miller. The kids in the film are both likable. Kirsten Dunst has had a substantial career after her childhood stardom and early roles and Gregory Smith is good enough as Alan. He went on to roles in the show Everwood and the movie The Patriot. It is hard to watch the film without mourning the loss of Phil Hartman. He was such an incredible comedic talent. This was his final role.

The special effects for Small Soldiers utilized models and practical effects from the late great Stan Winston along with some well done CGI. The effects hold up. In the interview with Joe Dante he mentioned that there was more CGI than was originally envisioned but due to the way the action figures were designed to move they were able to get away with murder. This film also features a score by Jerry Goldsmith. He was a perfect complement to Joe’s filmmaking and once again his score helped to make everything on screen work together.

The film was not without its challenges for Joe Dante. He had two different factions giving directions – Universal and DreamWorks- and they frequently gave different advice for the same scenes within the film. Most ridiculously, it was frequently recommended that violence in the film be toned down regarding violence towards the action figures. The executives recommending this must have never seen the tortures that young children inflict on their G.I Joes. The film’s original ending was also changed, which meant that Joe Dante’s original vision for the film was only three quarters of the way realized. That’s a shame because his original ending sounded pretty cool.

As it stands, I think Small Soldiers is ripe for rediscovery. Some of the humor that flew right over my head as a kid really landed well as an adult. It remains an enjoyable film to watch with the whole family.

Overall – 4/5

Small Soldiers is a fun family film from Joe Dante featuring some really great comedic performances and cool effects from Stan Winston alongside some effective CGI. The film has aged well and is worth revisiting if you have not seen it since it was released in 1998. I think that this was a case where at the time of its release some of the trailers for the film spoiled some of the fun for the kids who went to see it. Revisiting the film, I found it really engaging and at times very funny. The film was maybe just a little ahead of its time. I enjoyed rewatching the film. Hopefully at some point we will get a stateside Blu-ray!