Wonderful character development!

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

There are moments that feel comical, some horrific, and some downright inspiring but the tonal shifts hardly matter as the end results come to a film that's perfect for this time.

Fun movie. Watched it as a kid. Never even thought bout it being a spin off of Platoon tell I just rewatched it. Not a bad movie very entertaining.

After a failed mission in Cuba with three casualties, the mercenary Jonathan Shale (Tom Berenger) and his team composed by Joey Six (Raymond Cruz), Rem (Luis Guzmán), Wellman (Richard Brooks) and Hollan (William Forsythe) return to Miami. Meanwhile, the history teacher at the Columbus High School Jane Hetzko (Diane Venora) is threatened by the gangster Juan Lacas (Marc Anthony), who is the leader of the dangerous street gang Kings of Destruction. She reports the menace with her colleague Darrell Sherman (Glenn Plummer) to the Principal Claude Rolle (Ernie Hudson), but he does not take any attitude. When the scared Jane returns home, she meets he boyfriend Shale that was visiting her and they spend the night together. On the next morning, Shale has a meeting with the rogue lawyer Matt Wolfson (Cliff De Young) that offers a job to protect a shipment of drugs but Shale declines the offer. When he returns to Jane's apartment, he learns that she is jogging at the beach. He walks to meet her and save Jane from the attack of the strong punk Bull (Jim Warne) that breaks her kneecap and flees. She asks him to invite a substitute to replace her and Shale adopts the alias James Smith to replace Jane. Soon he learns that Lacas and Rolle are associated to the drug lord Johnny Glades (Rodney A. Grant) and using the school to store and distribute the drug in Miami. Shale summons his crew and decide to clean the school and eliminate the gangsters."The Substitute" is one of those action movies in the style of "Rambo" or "Death Wish" franchises that are brainless but in the same time highly attractive. The cast has Tom Berenger still in good shape in the role of the hero and many great villains. The story uses the violence of "Class of 1984", with a gang of delinquents threatening the teachers. For fans of this type of film, "The Substitute" does not disappoint. My vote is seven.Title (Brazil): "O Substituto" ("The Substitute")

Coming along some five years after the similar themed 'Toy Soldiers', two films about schools under fire from criminals. I guess that's about as far as the similarities go though as this is an undercover mission for some mercs/Nam vets where as the other film was terrorists taking over the school. So a nasty messed up city high school is plagued by drugs, weapons and bad eggs, what is the Principle to do??. Hire a badass killer merc of course, but the thing is he doesn't know the sub is a badass killer merc. So both the yobbish kids and the staff have no clue this guy is an ex-Nam hardass. As things progress for the Berenger the merc he finds out all is not what it seems.A perfect role for the stoic butch looking Berenger who can play military types till the cows come home. Not much is required of him really, beating the kids down, killing drug dealers, being a smartass...all in a days work. His little tight nit group of mercs are a cool bunch, a young Luis Guzman, the insane William Forsythe, military action flick regular Ray Cruz and Richard Brooks. A really good team of character actors that are great fun to watch, its just a shame we don't more of them in action together.Most of the film is a huge stereotypical montage of standard scenarios you can see coming a mile away. Its all very predictable and you know Berenger will never get hurt. Its undeniably fun to watch these sequences where the youths are acting up with their gangland dialect, waving their hands around making gang signs, virtually behaving like cartoon characters whilst being dressed like bums. At the same time all the girls looks greasy, sweaty and thoroughly unwashed haha need I say almost all the youths are black, Latino or Hispanic. Yep this film doesn't beat around the bush with racial attitudes towards suburban inner city schools in the US.So yes you could say its racist and a bad image on certain groups of young people but dare I say could it also be the truth?. That aside its still a rush to see Berenger humiliate the posers and stamp his authority on the class. I must also say Marc Anthony is really well cast as the slimy skinny gangland leader within the class, a simmering undertone ready to pop. You really do dislike this guy as the plot builds, you know Berenger could kick his ass but he still has that ominous presence, plus the fact he's only suppose to be a teen makes him even more annoying when he gets all mouthy. The whole thing is pretty hokey and like I said before it is very predictable. The finale shoot out within the school is cool though no doubt about that, although I would have preferred if the bad guys had brought lots of gang thugs to the battle instead of their special ops guys. That kinda dismisses the fact the good guys are a special ops team, its suppose to be mercs vs drug dealing thugs.Still its very cool to see all of Berenger's mercs kick ass in their own unique way. A final kudos to Ernie Hudson as the shifty principle of the school, his performance isn't much better than his hammy role in 'Congo' but that's why its so good. Definitely a bit of an adrenaline rush at times with this one, I think everyone has had fantasies about kicking the crap out of their old school bullies at some point. This would probably be a step too far but I'm sure being a badass merc teaching out of control youths a lesson would still be right up there.7/10

Here's one of those immensely satisfying albeit somewhat unlikely flicks in which the scumbags really get their just deserts. Think Dangerous Minds crossed with Death Wish and you'll have a pretty good gist of things here.The ever excellent Tom Berenger stars as a tough as nails mercenary who seeks retribution after his teacher girlfriend is viciously assaulted on the orders of a high school gang calling themselves the Kings Of Destruction. And what better way for our hero to get up close and personal with his quarry than to take the now vacant teaching position his girl friend has left at school and to pose as a substitute. In this assumed role our man quickly weeds out the problem students with some no nonsense discipline which will be sure to raise a smile on most viewers faces. Matters turn out to be a bit more complex however when it is revealed that the school principle is not quite such a genial chap as he at first appears.....in fact far from it as he is orchestrating the gang within his school and trafficking drugs via them. Subsequently our hero enlists the aid of his mercenary buddies to lend a hand and all merry hell subsequently breaks out including in one hilarious scene, one of our boys firing off a rocket launcher down a school corridor(!!!!!) Yes, whilst realism this may be woefully lacking, in fun it more than makes up for! Go on, treat yourself to this wonderful slice of carefree and highly satisfying escapism - you know you want to.