Soldier Boyz (1996)

I caught this film on like Spike or something on a Saturday night while I was waiting to go out. I'm a big Dudikoff guy (hence his inclusion in the DTVC Hall of Fame), and look for his films on TV whenever I can. They provide great enjoyment.

Soldier Boyz has Dudikoff as a former special forces dude working in a maximum security prison for really bad kids. Cary Tagawa kidnaps a rich dude's daughter in Vietnam, and the military naturally wants Dudikoff to go in there and free her. He agrees to on one condition: he can take a team of felon kids with him. Everyone was fine with it, so he recruits the best crew, gives them some high powered weapons, and dresses them in army fatigues. I'm pretty sure there was a training montage, but I just can't seem to remember. The kids perform admirably, Dudikoff vanquishes Tagawa, and everyone lives happily ever after.

I didn't exaggerate on this plot. It's that bad. Jacqueline Obradors plays one of the kids, and if you do the math, that would make her a thirty-year old teenager. I don't know why they didn't hire Luke Perry and Ian Ziering too. Also, her inclusion makes the title erroneous, as it would now be Soldier Peoplez. Just the same, other than Dudikoff, she was one of the few things in this picture that made it worth watching. I'm just glad she's gotten a better agent since then.

Cary Tagawa was another thing that made this great. He's one of the best all time baddies, just ask Dolph (Showdown in Little Tokyo and Bridge of Dragons). It was kind of sad to know he was going to lose in this one, but since it was Dudikoff, I was okay with it. It would be interesting to see a movie with him as a good guy.

Dudikoff was great.IMDb said he made a half a mill doing this, which doesn't sound like a bad deal if you ask me. This was the kind of role Dudikoff was made for... whatever that means. The idea of taking some juvenile killers and training them to do special-ops work is just straight preposterous. I can only imagine Dudikoff did this for the money, and I'm all right with that. He doesn't mail it in, yet he doesn't make much of an attempt to elevate an atrocious script. He just delivers a half a million worth of Duds, and afterwards I felt like he was worth every penny.

I can't lie, I'd be totally full of shit if I recommended buying this. It's as bad as the synopsis sounds. I'm not even sure I recommend renting it. It's just so bad. If you see it on TV, and you got nothing else going for a couple of hours like I did, you may want to give it a shot. Otherwise, I'd say this is too silly for even the most seasoned bad movie veteran. Watch a lot of other Dudikoff first, and then come back to this. It should only be seen in the context of Dudikoff as a DTVC Hall of Famer.

For more info: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114489/

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