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Toy Soldiers poster

Toy Soldiers

year 1991decade 90sdirector Daniel Petrie Jr.

111 minutes

Cast

Selected cast credits · Film reference

Sean Astin Billy Tepper
Wil Wheaton Joey Trotta
Louis Gossett Jr. Dean Edward Parker
Keith Coogan Snuffy Bradberry
George Perez Ricardo Montoya
T.E. Russell Hank Giles
Shawn Phelan Yogurt
Knowl Johnson Phil Donoghue
Denholm Elliott Headmaster Gould
Jerry Orbach Albert Trotta
Andrew Divoff Luis Cali
Michael Champion Jack Thorpe
Jerry Valdez Jorge
Jesse Doran Enrique Cali
Mason Adams Otis Brown
R. Lee Ermey General Kramer
Richard Travis Frank Ingram
Stan Kelly Sheriff Role
Jeffrey Dawson Security Guard

Toy Soldiers | The Rewatchables

host Bill Simmonshost Kyle Brandtproducer Craig Horlbeck
Explore episodeClose episode

Half-Assed Internet Research

Novel; budget; auditions; improvisation; locations; Yogurt nickname; careers; eighteen deaths

In the discussion (8)
Approx. transcript time · 00:11:54Read transcript
  • A feature reportedly said Wheaton wrote a character biography and watched The Godfather films; he recalled improvising the requested accent without studying a specific one.
  • The film is reported to adapt William P.Kennedy’s 1988 novel, directed by Beverly Hills Cop writer Daniel Petrie, with a $10 million budget and $15 million gross.
  • The banana-peel exchange was reportedly improvised and Gossett continued the scene.
  • Helicopter footage was reportedly filmed in San Antonio; the fictional Virginia school differs from the real Manhattan Regis.
  • Shawn Phelan reportedly acquired the Yogurt nickname after spilling yogurt in a van, and the film adopted it.
  • Petrie reportedly blamed the R rating for box-office trouble; Astin and Coogan knew each other growing up, and Astin had wanted the River Phoenix role in Stand by Me.
  • Coogan’s later career trouble is attributed in the cited research to a billing dispute and firing his agent after Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead.
  • The body count is corrected from a guess of 12 to 18.

Top Ten List

Die Hard villain scale: Rickman at ten; competing bottom rankings

In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 00:14:46Read transcript
  • A separate revised scale puts Powers Boothe at one, the Passenger 57 villain at two and the Toy Soldiers villain at three, reversing an earlier preference between Boothe and Toy Soldiers.
  • The villain scale initially puts the Toy Soldiers villain at one, criticizing his intimidation speech despite strong entrance, pivot and final-fight stages; a later utterance calls him two.
  • The stated ascending scale continues with Powers Boothe in Sudden Death at three, Willem Dafoe in Speed 2 at four, Dennis Hopper in Speed at five, John Lithgow in Cliffhanger at six, Tommy Lee Jones in Under Siege at seven, Ed Harris in The Rock at eight, Gary Oldman in Air Force One at nine and Alan Rickman’s Gruber at ten.
  • An alternate opinion places Jones at nine and would rank Lithgow and Hopper higher; Toy Soldiers is again called the worst while Boothe is another participant’s least favorite.

Roger Ebert's review

In the discussion (1)
Approx. transcript time · 00:21:20Read transcript
  • Ebert’s one-star review and criticism of the gimmicks are rejected as unfair to the film’s inventive pleasures.

Probably Unanswerable Questions

Autumn setting; mafia-character scale

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 00:22:57Read transcript
  • Soccer and the new school year suggest an early-autumn setting; the team’s record is jokingly guessed.
  • A loose mafia-character scale puts Jimmy Conway at ten, Sorvino’s Goodfellas character at nine, Sonny at eight and Albert Trotta around three-and-a-half or four; other examples and the genre’s resurgence are discussed.

Picking Nits

Vents; liquor strength; furniture; cigarette; phones; code; clothes; sewage; chest wound

In the discussion (10)
Approx. transcript time · 00:36:29Read transcript
  • The ceilings and vents are pristine and perfectly lit, without the rat droppings or cobwebs expected in an old school.
  • The inexperienced boys should be much drunker after the strong vodka mixture.
  • Moving the dean’s furniture and reproducing its exact arrangement outdoors would take enormous effort.
  • The unattended cigarette should extinguish before burning down far enough to ignite the matches.
  • The boys never revisit their established phone-tapping skills as a way to contact help.
  • The brief numerical code seems incapable of communicating which mafia son is being held.
  • The terrorists apparently bring no change of clothes for several days.
  • Billy’s sewage-soaked condition should undermine the claim that he has merely showered.
  • The lonely dean hanging up immediately on the phone-sex call is jokingly considered implausible.
  • Gossett’s character recovers implausibly quickly from a chest wound.

Casting What-Ifs

Schlesinger; Astin’s audition; Feldman

In the discussion (3)
Approx. transcript time · 01:09:08Read transcript
  • Schlesinger reportedly left the directing assignment for Pacific Heights, a decision viewed favorably.
  • Coogan reportedly read opposite Astin during his strong audition after already being cast.
  • Feldman reportedly auditioned but was not in the right place; possible roles are debated, with a Billy version imagined as entertainingly disastrous.

Recasting Couch

DiCaprio as Yogurt; Bronx Tale lead as Joey; Leguizamo, Garcia, Bauer or Smits as Cali

In the discussion (3)
Approx. transcript time · 01:12:16Read transcript
  • DiCaprio could play Yogurt, but would be too young for Billy and would need an expanded role.
  • The young A Bronx Tale lead is again preferred as Joey.
  • Leguizamo, Garcia, Bauer and Smits are proposed as stronger villain options.

Producer review

Enthusiastic; strong premise and score; believable gun inexperience

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 01:33:05Read transcript
  • The first-time review is enthusiastic about the plot, score and confined-location format, rejecting Ebert’s assessment.
  • Joey’s sudden death is surprising but respected for realistically showing an inexperienced gun user losing control.