When a Joe Dante movie is on blu-ray and there isn’t a commentary, I always wonder if it was a troubled production. 1998’s Small Soldiers is a such a disc and I suspect such a production. Admittedly, I don’t know anything that happened in the course of making this picture. But, between the lack of commentary and that I have no recollection of the movie being advertised at the time, I suspect Dante was less than thrilled with the results.
A key aspect of the movie which also indicates studio shenanigans is it doesn’t seem to know whether it wants to be a more kid-friendly picture or if it wants to appeal more to teens. Starring a teenaged Gregory Smith and Kirsten Dunst, it seems to be aimed at the latter. But the plot is clearly aimed more at kids, as it concerns action figures which are in two warring camps against each other.
Those groups the toys are divided into are aggressive military men called the Commando Elite and a race of peaceful aliens called the Gorgonites. The alleged heroes which are the military figures are like psychotic G.I. Joe’s, programmed to exterminate their foes. Those who they have waged war upon just want to be left in peace and opt to hide instead of fight.
It is no surprise the true bad guys, the soldiers, are voiced by such war and action movie staples as Tommy Lee Jones, Ernest Borgnine, Jim Brown, George Kennedy, and Clint Walker. Bruce Dern is also among their number, though I always think of him more so for such movies as Silent Runner. The Gorgonites are voiced primarily by Frank Langella, as Archer, a humanoid with feline characteristics and my favorite of the cast, toy or otherwise. Other aliens are voiced by such actors as Christopher Guest, Michael McKean and Harry Shearer. I was impressed to see the Spinal Tap cast reunited for this though, admittedly, I couldn’t tell who was whom and, even if I could, there isn’t much for them to do vocally.
The technology behind the toys is that of dangerous computerized weapons manufacturer Dennis Leary. His company acquires a toy company and the merger promises to bring “advanced battlefield technology into consumer products for the whole family”. The satirical edge of it makes it feel like something that could have been in Robocop. The name of the company is Globotech, which only brought to my mind the hilarious fake commercial in Mr. Show for Globochem, the company that owns everything so you don’t have to.
Speaking of that show, one of the toy developers behind the Small Soldiers line is David Cross. He really is more behind the design of the Gorgonites. Devious co-worker Jay Mohr is the mind behind the military figures. He also used Cross’s security access to order the military-grade microchips for the new line. He was able to do this because Cross happened to reveal the password is was given is “Gizmo”, a nice callback to Dante’s Gremlins.
The toys largely go to the large chain stores, but company truck driver (and Dante good-luck charm) Dick Miller gives some to Smith as an consignment for his dad’s toy store. Smith’s father (Kevin Dunn) won’t be pleased, as he doesn’t carry any war toys. I can appreciate that commitment to pacifism, but a store like that is accurately portrayed here as being unpopular. Smith jokingly suggests to Miller it might be better to torch the store, and the driver says, “Not a good idea. Arson forensics are really good nowadays.”
No need to commit insurance fraud, as the toy soldiers wreak havoc on the store overnight when they escape their boxes and literally tear apart the friendly aliens. Archer, that cat-man leader of the aliens, happened to be in Smith’s bedroom at the time, learning about the world at lightning speed through Encarta on a computer left on overnight. For those who weren’t of the right age in 1998, Encarta was a Microsoft product, an encyclopedia on CD-ROM. Oh, there’s a follow-up question? Right—so, CD-ROM’s were…oh forget it.
Archer is able to learn quickly, as the chips in the toys are an advanced A.I. technology. Of course, all the toys in the Small Soldiers line have the same tech, so the bad guys learn how to combine chainsaws and other hardware into weapons to destroy not just the alien toys but also the humans they now regard as traitorous for assisting the enemy.
Those humans include Dunst, in a role which doesn’t give her much more to do than be the girl-next-door and then girl-in-danger. The latter development occurs when her doll collection is given new programming courtesy of modifications made by the soldier action figures. Admittedly, the dolls are interesting and genuinely creepy, binding and gagging Dunst and saying such things as “Now it’s our turn to play with you” and “Let’s see if her head comes off!” At least she is given the opportunity to kick a lot of tiny ass once there is the obligatory rescuing of her by Smith. By the end of the film, she is literally mowing down the bad guys.
The third act is largely a war between a surprisingly large number of the military men and alien toys and several humans all together in Dunn’s house. This includes Ann Magnuson as Dunn’s wife and who proves she has literal game as she uses her tennis racket to return many of the flaming tennis balls shot into the living room. There’s also Dunst’s parents, played by Phil Hartman and Wendy Schaal. They aren’t given much more to do than be comic relief, and that’s enough. Alas, this was Hartman’s final film, which was completed after his death.
Hartman gets some solid lines, but he still feels underused. The line of his at which I laughed the hardest, and which feels like an ad lib, is an out-of-the-blue, “I think World War II is my favorite war”. Smith doesn’t much a great deal of screen presence, but he gets some decent laughs in moments such as when he talks to an extremely uncooperative Globotech customer service rep: “Look, is there a machine I can talk to?” Magnussen’s comic skills are underused, though there is a good bit where she rattles off a rather long list of drugs when she asks if her son is on anything. Largely, the best banter is between Cross and Mohr and these are the characters I most wanted to spend more time with. Consider Mohr’s defense to his partner for using military microprocessors: “They microprocess and they come from the land of ‘I saved your job’.”
The comedy actually makes the imbalance in tone even stranger. In the same way this picture feels conflicted as to which audience it is pursuing, it doesn’t seem to know whether it wants to be an 80’s action/comedy in the view of so many 80’s films or something more akin to a horror film. One minor bit in the film is emblematic of this issue, where one the soldier gets reassembled after being torn into pieces trying to pursue Smith. That the figures can be put together isn’t gruesome, but the screams from the toy while this is happening are hideous. So, these things can feel pain? I am not OK with that.
Overall, however, Small Soldiers creeps like a maimed A.I.-enabled G.I. Joe into the win column. Being a Joe Dante film, it will have some humor, some decent action set-pieces and even some surprises. It has such easy, all-ages gags as Archer think an order from Smith means the kid’s name is “Alan Nowshutup”, while also having such oddly adult asides as a desirable female character named Ms. Kegel. It is a picture that tries to aim for the demographic that is Smith and Dunst, while also trying to appeal to those the age of her younger brother, and not really satisfying either market. Speaking on Dunst, an oddly prescient scene has her exiting the house via her bedroom window. Smith says, “You’re done this before”, and she winkingly replies, “Once or twice”. That would be good practice for when she would do that repeatedly in the next year’s The Virgin Suicides.
Dir: Joe Dante
Starring Kirsten Dunst, Gregory Smith, David Cross, Jay Mohr
Watched on blu-ray