User reviews

The American Ninja, Michael Dudikoff, is back, although not as a ninja in this weak made-for-TV action film. Instead, he plays an ex-Marine hired by a wealthy businessman to rescue his kidnapped daughter from Vietnamese bandits. Vietnam films were pretty played out by the time this films was made, so I'm not quite sure why this was a story that needed to be told, especially since essentially same story was told much better in the 1983 John Milius produced "Uncommon Valor" (which incidentally Dudikoff had a brief non-speaking role). Dudikoff assembles his own Dirty Dozen out of a bunch of criminals and reprobates to carry out their predictable and dull mission. Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, an actor too good for this tripe, does as much as he can with his ridiculous villain role as the bandit leader. Overall, this is a pretty low rent Vietnam themed action film that's about 10 years too late.

What we have here is yet another version of the formula that became popular with the making of "The Dirty Dozen" (though we have fewer soldiers in this movie, probably due to the low budget.) It could have been an entertaining version of the formula, but "Solider Boyz" utterly fails. To begin with, the setup is ludicrous - would a millionaire whose daughter was kidnapped allow the lead soldier he hires to have a bunch of TEENAGERS who have almost no combat experience? (Why not hire professional mercenaries?) And there are other silly things like the fact the teenagers only get about ONE DAY of training! Plus, there are plenty of clichés, such as when one solider steps on a land mine and needs to be saved from it exploding.

The movie might have been made tolerable with some good action sequences, but the action sequences in this movie are horrible. All they are basically is shots of people firing guns towards the camera, over and over. It looks lazy and cheap, and so is much of the rest of the movie. The jungle locations look skimpy, and some scenes seem to be hastily shot, like when the millionaire's daughter is captured. As you can see, "Soldier Boyz" has problems going far beyond bad spelling.

I love dumb B war movies. This is not one of those. This makes Starship Troopers 2 look like The Longest Day. This is the worst movie I've ever seen in my life. I watched in on Encore a while back, and have remembered it to this day because of how utterly terrible it is.

Anyone who is comparing this movie to The Dirty Dozen is completely misleading, or has never seen the dirty dozen. The The Dirty Dozen was a well directed movie with good characters and development and an actual plot. This movie has no character development at all. Honestly, the characters are just racial stereotypes, there is the Mexican, the thuggish black guy, the crazy woman, the hates his parents white kid, its horrible.

This movie set a new bottom rung for movies. The acting is horrible, the scenery is terrible, the plot is miserable. I cant stress enough how terrible this movie is.

I have seen my fair share of mindless action flicks, and enjoyed a lot of them, but Soldier Boyz is easily the worst I have seen. Michael Dudikoff has no right to be on screen. He is so bad in this movie; he makes Van Damme look like Oscar material. The whole plot is something that I am pretty sure a monkey wrote. The holes ion the plot are numerous and big enough to walk through. The story and script seems to have been written for the sole purpose of having a bunch of thugs and Michael Dudikoff running through Vietnam. After about 5 minutes of watching this movie anyone with common sense can predict every single thing that happens in the narrative. So unimaginative, so constructed and so stereotyped it is really enraging. I plead to everyone who may potentially watch this movie, stay away! I sacrificed my time so that you can save yours. Don't make the same mistake I did. If I can prevent one person from seeing this movie, writing this will all be worth it.

P.S - This is the same director of Bats (Louis Morneau, 1999), and if you have seen that, this movie is even worse. Yes it is possible.

Michael Dudikoff (In a not so appealing haircut)stars as a prison warden named Tolliver who lets out six prisoners to do a dirty dozen style rescue, mainly a V.I.P's daughter who has been abducted by communist Vietnamese soldiers (Ah, isn't the cold war over, guess not.) along the way Dudikoff a former soldier trains the prisoners and leads the attack on Vinh Moc (Cary Hiroyuki Tagawa) in this lively actioner which although stupid at least offers the action with a good amount of flair. Indeed when compared to Dudikoff's duds like Crash Drive and Moving Target this comes off as a vast improvement. Still the story is undeniably silly and Dolph Lundgren's "Men Of War" did this type of story much better. Although sadly the 60's song "Soldier Boy" doesn't play once during the movie.

2.5/5 Matt Bronson

This movie is a stupid and cheesy 90's copy of classic "Dirty Dozen". Unfortunately Michael Dudikoff ("American ninja") is no Lee Marvin ("Delta force") and "Soldier boyz" is one bad movie. Everything sucks here – story , acting , dialogues , action scenes…

The American youth here is nothing , but a bunch of stereotypes. The violence on streets , street gangs , violence in family – this are all serious problems , but I doubt that any viewer will take this movie seriously. I mean who would care for such one dimensional characters like white skinhead (with a ridiculously fake swastika tattoo) , tough Latino girl , black "Monster" (that's his nickname !) rapist or Latino macho guy ?

The story is not one bit believable. Dudikoff as experienced ex soldier wouldn't have any problem to find ex-soldiers or at least mercenaries to do the job. Instead he risks the life of untrained and emotionally unstable bunch of psycho teenagers that don't like each other. It only gets dumber later , when he needs only 1 day to train them properly. After one day they are bad ass ! How cool is that ?

I don't remember the last time when I saw such badly done shootouts. The actors don't know at all how to carry the guns ! I love the scene when somebody shoots from the right side and the whole group starts shooting on the left side ! There is also one scene that rip-offs "Platoon". Do I have to mention that it's just as cheesy as the whole movie ?

Michael Dudikoff is very wooden. He tries hard to be an experienced bad ass soldier , but he just isn't convincing in the role. He doesn't even look old ! Yes , they gave him grey hair , but that's too little to convince the audience. The best performance here comes from Cary Hirouki Tagawa ("Showdown in little Tokyo") experienced actor who specializes in playing villains.

The funniest thing here is that it could actually be a decent and fun B-class movie if it was done right. Well , at least it's laughable. I give it 2/10.

I have trouble even knowing where to start. Okay here's a first go at it: WHAT THE F#CK!?

Let me give you a summary of the concept of this movie: Punks, Vietnam... Vietnam bad, punks worse... Who win? I am about sure that was what the scenario-writer wrote down when he made up this movie, but then again he must've either been 11 or mildly-retarded.

NOW, For the fantastic summary of stuff that makes this movie completely non-sense:

A. Everyone seems to fire assault-rifles from the hip, Here's a tip: DON'T, you won't hit a squirrel even if it was attached to the barrel of your gun.

B. Many fire assault-rifles using one arm, trust me... that will strain, break or ripture stuff in reality after a while.

C.They fire a pistol holding the thing tilted to the side, you won't hit an elephant from a meter's distance doing that.

D. The rebel Vietnamese fight for the purpose of 'No Trading With Tha Baddie U.S. of A.' but somehow they acquired U.S. made Hummers-trucks and Huey helicopters, Santa must've been sweet to them!!

E. Everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, in this movie pulls a face when shooting as if someone said: "Here's a piece of concrete, eat it and then poop it out within now and 10 minutes or I will kill you with a fork." Can you imagine that look? Good... thats how they look.

F. When one of the 'Operatives' is fleeing over a piece of grassland, he gets shot at by about 15 Vietnamese. He gets hit and during this firefight, the bullets seem to make him lose at LEAST 10 liters of blood. ...funny how we used to learn that a human has only so little amount of blood in its body.

G. Why the hell are these American-criminals carrying AK-47's!? H. Since when do criminals make good soldiers?

I. Since when do criminals turn good for no particular reason? J. Since when do criminals all look 'good'?

Okay, I bet I've demotivated you to watch this movie, thats good! When should you watch this movie? You want to laugh, you want to be agitated, you're stoned. This must've been a made for TV-movie, right? Because everything about this movie is cheap and made without any motivation of making it work. Everything, from beginning to the end, is predictable. This movie is one hell of an insult to any Vietnam-veteran as well as any soldier in the world. Cheers for comparing the average soldier's-skill to that of an untrained criminal, they will appreciate it.

The only thing I liked about this movie? This girl named Vasquez or something... why? She made me think of the girl that I love.

This movie was quite OK, not bad or good. It's about a billionaires daughter (Nicole Hansen) that are kidnapped in Vietnam by a terrorist grup led by Vinh Moc (Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa). A former major (Michael Dudikoff) are asked to being sent down there to find her, he does it if he are allowed to bring six prisoners and that they will be free after the operation (if they survive). One thing that is bad is that they choice following prisoners. A nazi-guy (Channon Roe), a female murderer (Jacqueline Obradors), a black mass murderer called the Monster (Cedrik Terrell), an innocent murderer that can fight (David Barry Gray), and one black man and one latino that wants to kill each other (Tyrin Turner and Demetrius Navarro). The movie makers choosed this because making the movie characters so tough as possible. But no one in the world would choose murderers and revenging people and put them together for a rescue mission and then release them if they survived.

And why do they have to have a women in the team. I'm not against women in movies or in tougher character roles, but I don't think you need a women in every war-movie just because you wants to show that you are not against women in war.

But the movie works because it has action. But that this kind of movie tries to put in some message about women being discriminated and humiliated by man is awful. If a movie can't handle the basic story and get some descent actors then no one cares about the message.

But as an action-flick its OK.

I saw this movie late night on HBO or something like that several years ago. The sheer stupidity of the concept just hit me several days ago.

A group of misfits from school get taken to vietnam for a covert operation? Huh?

I can just see the ads for the operation, study cooking hard or otherwise we will plant you on the Ho Chi Minh trail. The story is typical old Hollywood formula, a group of ragtag misfits who hate each other, come together, bond and save each other's lives. Ho hum.

What amazes me is that someone wrote this script, someone looked at this script, and said you know this could be a good movie to make. So, they went to the production company and studio and they said, you know this is such a great idea, let's give you several million dollars to make it. And wa la, we have a movie.

Michael Dudikoff is as wooden as ever and the rest of the cast is just creepy. To give this 3 stars is a crime.

To be generous, I would give it 0.5 stars out of 10.

Michael Dudikoff cares for delinquents… these are violent delinquents, who he would like to give a second chance to and if they choose to accept; freedom is there if they come back alive. Killers, rapists and psychotics of different backgrounds. And hey some are innocent. Hell he even negotiates a deal for 10 million dollars to a youth group. You know conning out the money of a rich tycoon who tries to hire him to rescue his daughter who has been kidnapped while doing aid work in Vietnam. So Dudikoff (who's in prison, but we never know why --- maybe it had something to do with the death of his wife and child in a drive-by shooting?) goes about picking a ragtag group of delinquent prisoners to go gangster and popping caps (you'll know what I mean when you see certain gunfire sequences) in the jungles of Vietnam. Watch as they bicker at each other, train their butts out and have a little hand-to-hand combat with the almighty Dudikoff. This is to prepare them to take on character actor Cary-Hiroyuki Tarawa (doing his usual viper shtick), his army and that helicopter. The whole thing is ridiculously obtuse and macho, but this routine b-grade in-and-out rescue mission entertains in sort of a teen version of "The Dirty Dozen". Be it from its trite script to paper-thin story and stereotypical characters looking to redeem themselves in some clichéd shape. However at least it moves at a quick pace, it's competently staged in its stunt work and there's a gratuitous amount of bloody action and hysteric slow motion. Sometimes comical and sloppy, but it's indeed gratuitous. And plus you got to have explosions. As it packs enough at the end. Too bad the climatic showdown comes to really nothing.

"I am the people."

Up till a few hours ago I was of the opinion that John Cena's debut movie 'The Marine' was the worse movie ever made. It was so godforsakingly awful that ever the memory of it brings a foul taste to my mouth.....I normally like Robert Patrick but he must have owed his dealer some megabucks to need money that badly to be part of that travesty.....

But, now, I have a new champion, a new movie that was so disgustingly awful that I am amazed and horrified that somebody actually ponied up the cash to:

a) Buy such an atrocious script b) Hire the worst 'actors', and I use the term in its loosest possible incantation, to star in said film c) Find any professional movie makers willing to risk their professional careers to be even associated with this d) Thought it was a good idea to make this at all

Where do you start?

The good points.....after thinking long and hard I decided that I wanted those 45 seconds back that a tried to find something positive to say. This waste of film deserves to have a star in its rating taken away for every single person associated with the making and distribution of it.

The bad parts....well the plot was amazingly stupid....I mean...you're ripping off one of the greatest classic war movies ever made and they botched it so badly they made Attack of the Killer Tomatoes look like a work of Shakespeare. Whoever was responsible for writing this garbage should have any and all writing implements removed from them for eternity and never be able to write or dictate so much as a shopping list. The actors....you know a movie is going to suck when the best actor in it is Michael Dudikoff.....he makes Vin Diesel look like he has all the talent, range and emotion of Sir Laurence Olivier. The rest of the cast was simply atrocious.....they don't even deserve to be struggling waiters....and the action! Oh my god....maybe some of the Generation Y posters might think that the action scenes were OK.....obviously playing Battlefield 2 for 6 weeks straight does affect the brain....but I've seen more realistic and action packed scenes in silent Charlie Chaplin films. You had boneheads...I mean supposed 'gangbangers', who look about as frightening as the local icecream man, running around with pistols 'gangsta style' one shotting everything in sight.....if that wasn't bad enough, some pelican is shooting an AK one handed AND thrusting the rifle forwards like he's stabbing someone with it with everyshot and he's one shotting hordes of Vietnamese extra's! LOL!!

Man, if I wasn't so bloody stoned and could have gotten off the lounge chair to find my remote I would have turned it off....but alas....it was just out of reach on the coffee table so I had to sit through it for an hour and a half. I now know exactly what CIA detainees are going through in secret prisons around the world! I've done my time in hell..watching this steaming dog turd of a movie....

You want to end the war on terror...drop copies of this screaming abortion on the Inturdgents in Iraq and the Talibunnies in the 'Ghan....they'll run screaming AND you'll have the UN on your arse about using WMD's....

How can crap like this get funding?? Who green lighted it and how can I contact him?

I need funding for a project I am putting together, it's about a killer robot driving instructor, who travels back in time for some reason. Ron Howard's attached to direct!

As much as I love a good mindless action flick, and as much as I love Michael Dudikoff in those flicks, this one just pushes too far. The acting is horrible, the characters cliched stereotypes, the plot nonsensical, and the action scenes are boring. Dudikoff must really need money bad to do tripe like this. It's movies like this and "The Shooter" that make "American Ninja" look like "The Godfather." Avoid at all costs.

Why do they even make movies like this??? Not everything can be Citizen Kane for sure, but this... Please.

Don't waste your time

1 out of 10

Like some of the other reviews, this movie ranked amongst my top 10 worst (maybe even the worst) I have ever seen. I saw the movie in German with no subtitles and was stunned to find that it all went exactly as I thought after seeing the first 15 minutes.

Bad acting, worse plot, awful loop holes and over used movie formulas - why does the 'crazy' guy always get the shotgun or the feuding rivals become blood-brothers before the end.

Holding an assault rifle sideways with one hand is never going to work and it made the action in American Ninja look respectable. It doesn't even offer the deliberate comedy aspect of Commando and feels like a cheap version of the 'Toy Soldiers', bad kids do something good plot.

Watch if you want to see a movie to add to your all time worst list.

art imitates life

The people who think this is a good movie is why the Internet sucks. Ignoring the plot holes, the nonsensical story and ridiculous fight scenes the acting alone should have had this movie canned before it was ever released.

The dirty dozen was an actually good movie. It starts with the premise that they use criminal soldiers. NOT JUST STREET THUG CRIMINALS. The dirty dozen actually were soldier who served in war time, not gangbangers who don't even know how to shoot a gun. But on top of the semi-plausible, but hooky plot in the Dirty Dozen, they decided to use real actors.

The fact that good films never get made and someone spends money on movies like this is the worst atrocity committed by this film.

If you just want to see some teen thugs shoot guns, badly, and see out of place and ridiculous explosions then this movie may be for you.

I doubt the concept of this movie would work in real life. A group of delinquents are recruited by Michael Dudikoff for a dangerous mission in Vietnam, forming a dirty half dozen (as the film was advertised). Despite the unbelievable go-point, the movie's pretty good, and does a good job creating the feeling of a hostile and deadly war area with dire consequences for the people who go there. One interesting element of this movie was watching Dudikoff acting with a cast of younger actors, and knowing his real-life passion for spending time with children, it makes one feel that he really believes in these kids despite the screw-ups they had made in their lives. The action is violent and bloody, but is needed and works in effectively creating a believable war zone. I like the fact the teens aren't all pretty-faced kids off the streets of Beverly Hills, as would probably be the case if it was made today. Fans of movies like THE DIRTY DOZEN and UNCOMMON VALOR should give this one a look.

omigod what an awful movie! I'm sitting here at 2:22 AM on a Sunday morning just laughing my ass off at this stupid POS, its so ridiculous. What's even more amazing than the absurd plot, the cardboard characters, the incredibly inept acting, the racial stereotypes, the lousy camera work, the nonsensical editing, the cheap production values, is the fact that this many IMDBers took the time to write a 10 line review of this movie! Definitely not worth the time! Very sad Dirty Dozen ripoff. Thank God I had my timer set for thirty minutes and it clicked off after the first scene. Don't think I could have taken much more!. Good for some belly laughs , though! Kept waiting for Chuck Norris to show up....