One of the best films i have seen

It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

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

I didn’t really have many expectations going into the movie (good or bad), but I actually really enjoyed it. I really liked the characters and the banter between them.

I just can't understand why this film was given a low score of 4.4 out of 10. This film was excellent and I also loved it. On Deadly Ground is an excellent Martial Arts Thriller about an environmental agent skilled in Martial Arts who has take on a ruthless and Malicious Oil Corporation. On Deadly Ground has some excellent acting by Steven Seagal, Michael Caine, Joan Chen, John C. McGinley and R. Lee Ermy. Michael Caines acting as the greedy and malicious villain Jennings was excellent and he really was great. The acting by the other actors was also excellent and On Deadly Ground was a tense film that I enjoyed watching. On Deadly Ground had some really tense action and also had some excellent Martial Arts fight scenes in it. This film might have been different to Above The Law and might have taken a long time for the fight scenes to come but the main thing was that they were in the film and they were also awesome.

This action movie sees Steven Seagal playing Forrest Taft, a trouble-shooter for Aegis Oil. In the opening scene he puts out a fire at one of their wells; here he is told that the fire happened because company boss Michael Jennings insisted on using substandard parts to save money. Taft starts looking into this and soon Jennings and his henchmen are trying to kill him... Aegis has to open its new well in thirteen days or it loses the drilling rights; Jennings will do anything to make sure nobody interferes with his timetable. After the first attempt on his life Taft is rescued by the local Nanive American tribe. They nurse him back to health then he sets off with Masu, daughter of the chief and environmental activist, to stop Jennings bringing the new well into operation; something Taft knows would lead to an environmental disaster. It won't be easy though; as well as Aegis's own security people Jennings has called in a team of mercenaries.Things get off to a good start with shots of pristine Alaskan wilderness before we see the burning well. Little time is wasted introducing our hero and main villain... then things start to get far too obvious. We see Seagal beating up racist oil workers who abuse Natives at a bar juxtaposed with a scene where Jennings, played by Michael Caine, gives a speech about the company's environmental concerns when it is clear he couldn't care less. As one might expect from a Steven Seagal film there is lots of action; this includes fighting, shooting, many explosions and a man being pushed into a helicopter's tail rotor; this action is pretty good although not as gritty as his earlier films. The scenery is impressive although it seemed odd that one moment they were in barren areas covered in snow the next they were in forests with no snow to be scene! The cast are okay, but all of the actors I recognised have been better in other films; at least Michael Caine's somewhat over the top villain is rather fun and R. Lee Ermey is solid as the head mercenary. The biggest problem with the film is its lack of subtlety with its environmental message; it might as well have been called 'Green Peace: The Movie'. There are numerous heavy handed comments throughout the film but none were as bad as Seagal's speech at the end. The silly thing is the massage could have been got across without these moments which detracted from the action and ultimately came across as annoying, conspiratorial rants from eco-activists. Overall this isn't terrible; it delivers well enough on the action but expects you to be lectured too in the process.

After making a name for himself with his string of late '80s/early #90s action thrillers - mainly dealing with corrupt cops and tough city life - Seagal went on to bigger thing with UNDER SIEGE. However, after a while, something bad happened. Seagal, an environmentalist, got it into his head to include out-of-place messages to the viewers about the damage we're causing the earth, and this influence can be seen in ON DEADLY GROUND, FIRE DOWN BELOW, and even in his 1996 crime thriller, THE GLIMMER MAN. ON DEADLY GROUND is an odd film - a typical action fest, with some hugely inappropriate content seemingly tacked on in the middle and at the end of the film. The perpetrator of this crime is none other than Seagal himself, unwisely given directorial control for the first time (and probably the last, judging by the poor reception this film received at the box office). While I did enjoy moments of ON DEADLY GROUND as much as Seagal's best work, there are many problems to contend with.The first is the pacing. For an hour, the action content is kept to a minimum, with a single bar fight being the sole beating that Seagal delivers. Happily, he's up to his usual habit of breaking wrists and beating up on bad guys who are bullying an Eskimo for fun. The whispering hard man veers close to torture at one point, as he repeatedly humiliates and forces bone-breaking blows down upon his unwilling opponent. The rest of the hour's time is a literal whirlwind (no scene lasts for more than a few minutes, with the exception of one notable moment, which I'll come to in a second) of corruption and pretty scenery, and a silly moment where Seagal, injured by an explosion, is brought back to life by the Eskimos and goes on a 'spiritual journey'. What a load of rot.Now, I'm one of Seagal's biggest fans, at least of the films he made in his heyday, but this sentimental stuff is hugely out of place in a film like this. In fact, it's laughable, and ruins any fun we might have been having as it's just so darned boring. And pointless. Happily, once it's over Seagal gets down to shooting and breaking up the baddies, and this time around he has more than his fair share of enemies to combat, the body count reaching the mid 30s and being surprisingly high for a film of this kind. In the final act, he infiltrates an oil rig and blows everything up. This part feels a lot like UNDER SIEGE and follows the basic pattern of blow something up, kill some baddies, blow something up, kill some baddies. I love films like this and the deaths are all varied and quite creative, some guys burn, a guy is thrown into the rotors of a helicopter, someone dies in a car crash, other guys are beaten to a pulp. Seagal makes traps for his enemies, just like in the UNDER SIEGE films, and these are bits I love too. The best bit was where he used a plastic coke bottle as a makeshift silencer for his gun.The acting ranges from the hilariously inept to completely over the top, courtesy of Michael Caine as the stereotypical comic book-type villain, who constantly swears and rants at people. He's great. I know how people hated to see this fine actor lower himself, but over the top acting is one of my secret loves (over the top acting that is, not wooden acting). Seagal is his basic self (let's face it, he plays the same character in every film), while Joan Chen is virtually unnoticeable in a supporting role. John McGinley lends solid support as a fellow bad guy, as does R. Lee Ermey as a crew-cut mercenary. ON DEADLY GROUND is by no means a good film, and it's seriously marred by Seagal's self-righteous speech at the end about pollution. Yes, man, we agree, but not here! There is some good action and good fun to be had if you can overlook these flaws. A classic example of a so-bad-it's-funny film.

Steven Seagal had a meteoric rise as a martial arts action star, quickly graduating from straight to video to box office number one movies. His success with Under Siege gave him enough clout to direct and star in On Deadly Ground and have a serious message on the dangers of capitalism and respecting the environment.Michael Caine who has is hair dyed dark for the film hams it up as the villain of the film. He plays big bad oil magnate who wants drill for oil in Alaska and in Eskimo land. Caine has a group of bad assed henchmen who are willing to get their hands dirty for kicks it seems.Seagal is one of them who plays Forrest Taft, a specialist oil rig fireman. However he turns on the corporate suits when he asks Caine, 'how much is enough?' Caine ends up trying to get rid of him unsuccessfully. Thankfully for Taft he is rescued by the Alaskan Eskimos and goes on a spiritual and environmental rebirth where he realises the importance and respect for animals, the land and tribal people.Thankfully he also wants revenge on the oil company and Caine hires some big guns to deal with him which includes R Lee Ermey and Billy Bob Thornton but Seagal is a man with hidden talents as he seems to be ex CIA and an expert on combat as well as putting out fires. I would not be surprised if he could cook as well and Ermey's mercenary soon regrets the threat he made to Taft.Obviously by 1994 Seagal was on a roll. His recent films had bigger budgets, better scripts, better production values and some big stars. However this is an ego trip too much. The directing is nothing much than a vanity exercise. Warner Brothers should had got a more experienced director to re-cut the film as the pacing is poor and for an action film, after a bright start (with some good explosions) it becomes plodding and boring. Somewhere in this mess is a decent action film with some humour, fight scenes, action and political points that someone like Andrew Davis (who made Under Siege) could had directed better.The bad guys are suitably one note which is nasty. Caine just turned up for the pay cheque and have a look around Alaska but then you have that speech at the end, the film which really takes the biscuit.Now I do not mind after going through countless right wing action stars to have one with leftist leanings. But do I want an elongated social statement at the end of an action film on the evils of capitalism, corrupt politicians and green issues? I have no doubt that Seagal is sincere in his beliefs, but while a few barbs here and there would had been sufficient, the rant at the end sunk a poor action film down even further.