Small Soldiers Behind the Scenes: Creating the Gwendy Attack Effect

Creating the Gwendy Attack Effect for Small Soldiers

For Joe Dante’s 1998 film, Small Soldiers, Stan Winston Studio designed and built both the Commando Elite soldiers and the alien Gorgonites, all of which were realized as articulated puppets. 

In total, Small Soldiers featured fourteen distinct characters: seven types of Gorgonite, six different Commandos, and there was also a parody of the Barbie and Sindy dolls (Sindy was Britian's rival to Barbie): a Gwendy fashion doll. 

Jump To Section

• Designing Toys for Small Soldiers
• Using the Compy Attack Technique for Gwendy
• The Technology in Mouse Hunt
• Gwendy Doll Types in Small Soldiers

Designing Toys for Small Soldiers

For the Gwendys, Stan Winston set up a kind of creative free-for-all within the studio, letting key artists loose to draw as many designs as they cared to. After the artists had generated hundreds of drawings, Winston narrowed the designs down to those he liked best. Joe Dante, Hasbro, and executive producer Steven Spielberg narrowed the concepts further. Once an artist's design had been chosen and approved, the designer could follow that character through doing the final sculpting, painting, and then on-set puppeteering.

(A compilation of some of the Gwendy concept artworks created at Stan Winston Studio for the movie Small Soldiers.)

Using the Compy Attack Technique for Gwendy

Mechanical designer Christian Colquhoun worked on a particular technique for The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997), where a pack of small Compsognathus dinosaurs (aka "Compy's") attacked Peter Stormare. "In Small Soldiers," according to Colquhoun, "we pretty much used the same style and technique of doing that for the Gwendy attack."

Watch a short behind-the-scenes look at the "Compy" dinosaur attack from The Lost World: Jurassic Park with actor Peter Stormare (as Dieter Stark) at Stan Winston Studio:

"It was two lines of spectra, which is a high strength, low stretch line put through some bicycle derailleur cable housing that we'd run under a neoprene suit that we put on Kirsten Dunst (as Christy Fimple). We connected pads on the neoprene suit that we could attach to the Gwendy suit, and then the neoprene would kind of pad out the suit to ensure we didn't see the lines," said Colquhoun.

(Polaroid image of actor Jonathan Bouck testing the padded neoprene suit with the attached Gwendys.)

(Greg Figiel and Christian Colquhoun work on the Gwendy attack suit for Kirsten Dunst's scene.)

"The spectra lines were attached to the arms and legs to make it look like the puppets were beating on her. The spectra went out on handles, and we could puppeteer the dolls however we wanted: pulling an arm, a leg, or both simultaneously."

(Behind-the-scenes image of Kirsten Dunst in the Gwendy attack suit on set of Small Soldiers.)

The Technology in Mouse Hunt

Christian Colquhoun had used his spectra and derailleur housing technique previously for Gore Verbinski's movie Mouse Hunt (1997).

(Christian Colquhoun works on the delicate interior mechanics of the animatronic mouse Stan Winston Studio built for Mouse Hunt.)

Watch one of the animatronic mouse motion tests for Mouse Hunt at Stan Winston Studio:

Gwendy Doll Types in Small Soldiers

There were many types of Gwendys in the movie. Some were radio-controlled, and some were puppeteered with the spectra cables.

(Some of the radio-controlled Gwendy Dolls at the Stan Winston Studio.)

"A couple were just hooked on, so Kirsten Dunst could pull them off and throw them," noted Colquhoun. "There were some foam ones that she could beat on, and there were also a few close-up radio-controlled versions that had opening mouths, opening and closing eyes, and turning heads." 

(Lance Gilmer works on one of the Gwendy dolls at the Stan Winston Studio.)

(Mike Harper works on another Gwendy doll at the Studio.)

(Closeup image of a Terminator-style Gwendy doll.)

"There were all sorts of different types of style. We would kitbash, and augment, like stretching faces and stretching things that were supposed to look like they were built by the small soldiers themselves to be like an attack squadron."

(Work-in-progress image of some of the Gwendy dolls.)

(Three finished Gwendy dolls from the attack squadron made for Small Soldiers.)

"I'm really grateful that I got to work on Gwendy," added Christian Colquhoun, "It was a great effect, and I want to thank everyone who was involved in it: all the lab people, the sculptors, EVERYONE!" 

Courses with the Creators of Small Soldiers

• Hybrid Characters: Blending Practical & Digital FX with John Rosengrant
• Hybrid Character Design: Practical To Digital with Christopher Swift
• How To Make An Eye Mechanism - Design, 3D Printing & Assembly with David Covarrubias
• Animatronic Control Systems - Arduino Programming Basics Part 1 with David Covarrubias
• Creature Screenwriting: How To Write Memorable Monsters with Juliet Snowden & Stiles White
• How To Make A Monster Puppet - Rods & Cables with David Monzingo
• Makeup Blood FX - Blow Your Brains Out with David Monzingo

To create your own toys, check out these courses:

• Toy Design & Sculpture For Action Figures & Collectibles - Part 1 with Sandy Collora
• Toy Design & Sculpture For Action Figures & Collectibles - Part 2 with Sandy Collora

To bring your toys to life, check out our Mechanical & Animatronic FX Pathways:

• For Beginners: Mechanical & Animatronic FX Basics
• For Intermediate-Advanced level: Mechanical & Animatronic FX

More Small Soldiers Stuff From Stan Winston School:

• Small Soldiers - Creating the Ultimate Toys
• Small Soldiers - Puppet Performance
• Small Soldiers - Rehearsing a Puppet Battle
• Small Soldiers fan, J.R. DeJesus recreates Commando Elite & Gorgonite Armies - Artist Spotlight