CommentsXp Best movie ever!

Taraparain Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

Aneesa Wardle The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Calum Hutton It's a good bad... and worth a popcorn matinée. While it's easy to lament what could have been...

SnoopyStyle Jonathan Shale (Tom Berenger) is a Vietnam vet and mercenary. His mission to destroy a Cuban drug facility fails and his crew is disavowed. He returns to Miami where his girlfriend Jane Hetzko teaches history in a rough school. She confronts a gang led by student Juan Lacas (Marc Anthony). She's attacked by a big Seminole and rescued by Shale. Shale goes undercover as substitute teacher James Smith. Claude Rolle (Ernie Hudson) is the corrupt principal.This is another one from the genre of white teacher saves gang-ridden school. The difference here is that the teacher is freaking Rambo. The violence is dialed up to body-count territories. It can't be taken seriously. It also can't be completely taken as action fun. Some may see this as camp. I see this as something that struggles in between.

zardoz-13 "FX" director Robert Mandel's urban crime thriller "The Substitute" fuses elements of "Blackboard Jungle" with "The Equalizer." In "Blackboard Jungle," a teacher (Glenn Ford) tangled with savage, inner-city youth. In the CBS-TV thriller series "The Equalizer," an urban security expert allowed his clients to resume life without fear from assailants.Tom Berenger stars as a covert operations specialist on holiday who finds himself back into the classroom to rumble with a drug czar and his killers. The action is as fast and as furious as one of the submachine guns fired in this larger-than-life, but exciting exercise in educational reform. Mandel and "Street Trash" scenarist Roy Frumkes, "Substitute 2" scribe Rocco Simonelli, and "Cat People" writer Alan Ormsby have created an entertaining, suspenseful, sometimes amusing, melodrama with a minor surprise or two. "Ghost Busters" star Ernie Hudson registers splendidly as a corrupt high school principal who abuses his authority by allowing sales of narcotics on his premises.An earnest, forthright teacher Jane Hetzko (Diane Venora of "True Crime") confronts high-ranking gang-banger Juan Lacas (Marc Anthony of "Hackers") during a campus brawl, and he doesn't like the way that she talks to him so he threatens her. Later, as Jane is jogging by herself along the beach, a thuggish Seminole confronts her and cracks one of her knee caps with a bat. Jane's off-again, on-again boyfriend Jonathan Shale (Tom Berenger of the "Sniper" movies)tangles briefly with the brute before the brute escapes. Jane lands in the hospital and Shale takes care of her. Shale calls for Jane's usual substitute, but the man isn't available. Instead, Shale gets one of his mercenary buddies, Rem (Luis Guzmán of "Anger Management"), to put him into the school's computer system as James Smith with three diplomas from prestigious Ivy League universities. Shale has the time to devote to Jane's problem, because his men and he have completed a mission that attracted too much international attention and he has to cool it for a while. Meantime, he keeps his surviving commandos in line and out of harm's way. A job to guard drug shipments comes up, but once our virtuous hero learns that he would be killing to ensure the safe passage of narcotics, he turns the job down cold and reprimands his comrade, Joey 6 (Raymond Cruz of "The Rock") for setting up the interview.Instead, Shale masquerades as a substitute school teacher when he cannot get an actual substitute for Jane. He assembles his team and tells them that where drugs are concerned, money can be found in large quantities. This serves as their inducement to mobilize their special skills. Along the way, another caring teacher, Mr. Darrell Sherman (Glenn Plummer of "Saw 2") gets in the way of the villains, particularly Claude Rolle (Ernie Hudson of "Ghost Busters") and pays the ultimate price. The heroes and the villains turn the high school into a battlefield. The villains have stashed a lifetime's worth of cocaine in the school's maintenance garage and Hollan (William Forsythe of "Once Upon A Time in America") rigs it up with explosives so when the bad guys go to retrieve it, they are blown up. Not all of the good guys survive this bullet-riddled shoot'em up. "The Substitute" ranks as an above-average thriller.

Frank Markland Tom Berenger stars as Shale, a mercenary who becomes the substitute teacher taking in for his girlfriend after she is temporarily crippled by the gangs that run the school, figuring out that the principal is in on it, Berenger and his crew of mercenaries (William Forsythe and Luiz Guzman among them) break up a drug ring while Berenger actually likes to teach. Tom Berenger is quite convincing in the mercenary role but not so convincing in the teacher sequences which ultimately leaves one chuckling at the situations. This movie is of course the ultimate teacher's wish fulfillment as Berenger sends students packing through the window and then even manages to engage in hand to hand combat with said students. It is a ridiculous movie but because the action sequences are handled with excitement we cave in and accept the movie on it's own terms. This isn't a great movie but it is a decent guilty pleasure and I for one loved the moment when Berenger said "Ssh no talking in the library!" right before he pushes a table into the students in question.* * out of 4-(Fair)

atlantismedia This movie, set in South Florida, incorporates history and realistic action to weave an entertaining story of South Florida crime. Tom Berringer is believable as a mercenary who seeks to find out why his girlfriend is attacked by a high school gang by becoming a substitute teacher. The acting, across the board, is excellent. The school principal, Glenn Plummer, provides a believable ringleader of the school gang with a powerful acting role. Mark Anthony is outstanding as his top henchman and provides one of the best acting jobs of any singing entertainer since Mark Walberg. MA is a natural! The action is never static, the fights are believable in comparison to standard Hollywood fare, the locations are real and the overall dialog and cinematography is outstanding. No cheap tricks like unnecessary explosions or animation matting needed to cement this action in reality. I highly recommend this movie (even on standard TV having to wait through the ads is not a problem). It is entertaining, credible and keeps you hooked to see how they wrap it up. If you like gritty, real, down-to-earth action with high school kids who are more than cardboard characters, this is a movie you'll love. If you're from South Florida, it is a major bonus seeing SF locations although jumping from Fort Lauderdale to Miami stretches the reality of living in this area. Rent it, buy it, love it.