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Soldier
Sergeant Todd is a veteran soldier for an elite group of the armed forces. After being defeated by a new breed of genetically engineered soldiers, he is dumped on a waste planet and left for dead. He soon interacts with a group of crash survivors who lead out a peaceful existence. The peace is broken as the new soldiers land on the planet to eliminate the colony, which Sergeant Todd must defend.
1998 · Directed by Paul W. S. Anderson · 99 min · Science Fiction · Action · Drama · Screenplay in the scene database · 12 frames
Tagline
The best soldier they ever created just became their worst nightmare.
Plot
In 1996, an experimental military program selects and raises a group of orphaned infants to be trained as highly disciplined, ruthless, professional soldiers. Recruits considered physically or mentally underperforming are culled and the survivors are turned into ultimate fighting “machines” with no understanding of the civilian world.
In 2036, Sgt. Todd 3465 is a hardened veteran and one of the original 1996 infants, but his unit is about to be replaced by genetically engineered super soldiers, designed with superior physical attributes and a lack of emotion, except complete aggression. Colonel Mekum, leader of the project, introduces his newest group to Captain Church, the commander of Todd's unit, who insists on testing the new soldiers' abilities against his battle proven soldiers. Mekum suggests pitting three original soldiers against one new soldier, Caine 607, who easily defeats the three. Cain bites down on Todd’s arm so Todd gouges out Caine's eye to break free before falling from a great height. The body of a dead soldier cushions his fall, and he appears to be dead. Mekum orders their bodies disposed, declaring them obsolete, while the remaining older soldiers are demoted to menial support roles. For carelessly losing his eye, Cain is demoted to take point.
Todd is discarded on Arcadia 234, a waste disposal planet. He limps toward a colony whose residents crash-landed there years earlier; as they were believed dead, no rescue missions have been attempted. Todd is sheltered by Mace and his wife Sandra. Though they try to make him welcome, Todd has difficulty adapting to the conflict-free civilian community due to his hyper-vigilant military conditioning. While Todd develops a silent rapport with their mute son, Nathan, who had been traumatized by a snakebite as an infant, he soon begins to experience flashbacks from his time as a soldier and mistakes one of the colonists for an enemy, nearly killing him. To make matters worse, in a later conflict with a snake, Todd forces Nathan to face it down and strike back to protect himself. His parents disapprove of the lesson, unsure of how to deal with Todd.
Plot summary from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA.
Crew
- Screenplay: David Webb Peoples
- Cinematography: David Tattersall
- Edited by: Martin Hunter
- Music: Joel McNeely
- Production design: David L. Snyder
- Produced by: Jerry Weintraub
Cast
- Kurt Russell as Todd 3465
- Jason Scott Lee as Caine 607
- Jason Isaacs as Colonel Mekum
- Connie Nielsen as Sandra
- Sean Pertwee as Mace
- Gary Busey as Church
- Michael Chiklis as Jimmy Pig
- Sara Paxton as Angie
- K.K. Dodds as Sloan
- James Black as Riley
Production
- Country: United States of America, United Kingdom
- Language: English
- Studios: Impact Pictures, Jerry Weintraub Productions, Morgan Creek Entertainment, Warner Bros. Pictures
- Budget: $75,000,000
- Box office: $14,594,226
- Themes: spacecraft, space marine, showdown, war veteran, fight, dystopia, space travel, time bomb, alien planet, battlefield
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