On Deadly Ground/YMMV

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.


  • Alternate Character Interpretation: The film could very easily be re-cut with Forrest as the villain. He murders several people on Jenning's oil facility, including people who are unarmed and defenseless, and blows up their entire oil rig in a grand act of eco-terrorism.
  • Anvilicious: The villain is so mean he can't even stand the smell of caribou to film one commercial.
  • Black Hole Sue: Forrest is an arguable example. No matter what happens, the crowd seems to always be on his side. An example of this is during the conference when Jennings lists Forrest as part of the sabotage conspirators, you can hear someone yell out "Bullshit," despite having no reason at all to do so! Not to mention, Masu's perfectly reasonable idea to go to the press with Aegis' dealings instead of confronting Jennings is immediately shot down.
  • Designated Hero: Forrest's actions are essentially eco-terrorism and he passes over several reasonable chances to show mercy or defeat his enemies without violence for no clear reason. At the end of the film, he outright murders the unarmed and defenseless antagonist.
  • Harsher in Hindsight: Blowing up the oil rig becomes a lot harder to watch after the Gulf Oil Spill.
  • High Octane Nightmare Fuel: Hugh's torture scene. An old man is bound to a chair and his fingers broken with a whale bone and later a pipe cutter is used on him. Part of this scene, according to Film Brain, is cut from the UK release, and when he says that the scene is better trimmed, he's right, since enough of the scene played out still gives us what we need to hate the characters.
  • Jump the Shark: Seagal's career was never the same after this movie flopped.
  • Moral Event Horizon: Macgruder after Hugh's torture and even MORESO after the Inuit village raid.
  • Narm: "THERE IS NO I IN TEAM! THERE IS T-E-A-M!!"
  • What the Hell, Casting Agency?: Aside from a Knighted British legend, they got R. Lee Ermey in this film. R. Lee Ermey! They must've paid him a lot to put up with what he did.
    • Well, seeing as Ermey's death in this film involves him basically walking up behind Seagal's character and allowing Seagal to get within arms reach of his shotgun...yeah. R. Lee Ermey, a former Army Marine Corp sergeant, didn't take a clear shot right at Seagal's back.
    • Meanwhile, they brought in John C. Mc Ginley pre-Scrubs to play...a psychotic torture expert?