Small Soldiers is no Toy Story, but director Joe Dante delivers a moderately entertaining movie with high production values and low-brow parody.

| Original Score: 2/5 | Feb 19, 2025

| Original Score: C+ | Sep 7, 2011

...this smells like a script slapped together around a toy-product launch.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/4 | Apr 12, 2002

Though it starts promisingly, the picture ends as a standoff between the affection Dante and company bring to the project and its increasingly frenetic and tiresome emphasis on what special effects can make its little people do.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Feb 14, 2001

...for all its shortcomings, the end result is quite entertaining.

| Original Score: 3/5 | Jan 1, 2000

Fortunately, it's possible to ignore the morals entirely and simply enjoy the filmmakers' skill at creating carefully contained mayhem in a microcosm.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Jan 1, 2000

I can't think of a Hollywood entertainment I've enjoyed as much all year, and both audiences I saw the movie with seemed delighted as well.

Full Review | Original Score: 4/4 | Jan 1, 2000

Stan Winston's miniature and CGI effects are wonderful, but they can't conceal an obviously weak script in what is unfortunately a footnote to Dante's better work.

| Original Score: 2.5/5 | Jan 1, 2000

Full Review | Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jan 1, 2000

As with many films in which special effects are the real stars, the technology here commands more respect and interest than the material otherwise warrants.

Full Review | Original Score: 2/5 | Jan 1, 2000

What bothered me most about Small Soldiers is that it didn't tell me where to stand--what attitude to adopt.

| Original Score: 2.5/4 | Jan 1, 2000

This live-action, animated feature has all the charm of the entirely animated Toy Story plus an audacity all of its own.

| Original Score: 3/4 | Jan 1, 2000

...wildly entertaining...

Full Review | Original Score: 3/4 | Jan 1, 2000

| Original Score: C+ | Jul 10, 1998