Small Soldiers is the latest release from Steven Speilberg's movie company Dreamworks. Directed by Joe Dante (Gremlins), Small Soldiers is a dark comedy that maintains his style.
The story begins with Gil Mars (Dennis Leary) new CEO of Globotech, a military hardware supplier, who is trying to make his company profitable by expanding into other areas, like toys. He enlists the aid of two toy designers, Larry and Irwin, who combine their various toy ideas to create a new "fad" market of commandos vs. aliens. Throw in a new experimental military microchip designed for warfare and you have a recipe for disaster.
The innocents in this movie are a troubled teenager Allen Abernathy (Gregory Smith) who is trying to win back the trust of his family after a series of events that have caused him to be kicked out of two schools, and Christy Fimple (Kristen Dunst), the 16 year old girl-next-door. Neither of them have much luck convincing their parents about the walking, talking, a-- kicking toys until it's almost too late. Christy's father is played by the late Phil Hartman in his last movie roll.
The movie moves along with typical Dante humor and surprise action (not so surprising if you've watched Gremlins too much). The toys are extremely funny. Main commando Major Chip Hazard (voice by Tommy Lee Jones) and main alien Archer (voice by Frank Langella) are very convincing as toys come to life. To tell who and what are the good guys and bad guys would give away too much of the story but it has to do with the difference between war toys and educational toys.
There are many cameo voices in the movie. Most of the original cast of the Dirty Dozen do voices for the commando toys and Sarah Michelle Geller and Christina Ricci do voices for the Barbie-type dolls that have been assimilated like tiny plastic Borg.
On the whole the movie is very funny. Not something to take small children to but most older kids should have fun. I would say the best description of the movie is like a cross between Gremlins and the A-Team with a dash of Toy Story and Terminator thrown in for spice.
Ted's movie rating is 3 1/2 stars out of 4.