„That Movie Said Everything 20 Years Earlier”. Steven Seagal Is Confident That He Was Ahead of His Time with The Help of This Movie Flop
Steven Seagal has come to the defense of his pro-environment film from 30 years ago, which he believes was ahead of its time.
Although Steven Seagal's career is long, his fame in Hollywood was short-lived and the actor is now starring in lower-grade productions. But one of his biggest film failures debuted back in 1994. We are talking about the movie in which he not only played the main role, but also directed it.
On Deadly Ground is a production in which a man played by Seagal decides to thwart the plans of an oil company intending to develop Alaska's pristine land. However, the pro-environmental film wasn’t a success, earning only $38.6 million in the US (while worldwide it reportedly grossed $78.1 million) on a budget of $50 million. In addition, the production was crushed in reviews by critics and viewers alike, as can be seen, for example, by the results of On Deadly Ground on Rotten Tomatoes, where the movie boasts only 14% positive reviews from critics and 35% from viewers.
With the opinion that On Deadly Ground isn’t a good film agreed the actor appearing in it, Michael Cain, who shared his thoughts in the Daily Mail. He emphasized the fact that, in his opinion, Seagal's work falls into the category of bad films, in which he acted out of desperation, as he stopped receiving new scripts for consideration.
I got desperate to the point that I accepted a picture in Alaska with Steven Seagal, the martial arts expert. The movie was called On Deadly Ground and the title was to prove apt. Although Steven and the rest of the team were great to work with, I had broken one of the cardinal rules of bad movies: if you're going to do a bad movie, at least do it in a great location.
In contrast, Seagal, in an interview with Ain't It Cool, defended his work, saying that it was ahead of its time, and is simply a very good film.
I think On Deadly Ground is a special film in the sense that it did and said everything 20 years earlier that Al Gore did when he got an Academy Award and a Nobel Peace Prize, which is hilarious. But it’s a very good movie because of the message and all of that. Major motion pictures that are environmental movies are very few and far between. So that one I like quite a bit.
Al Gore is a former vice president of the United States who campaigned on global warming education. He was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his work against global climate change. And an Oscar-winning documentary film, An Inconvenient Truth, was made about his campaign in 2006.
Seagal pointed out in his statement that while Al Gore has been singled out for his commitment to publicizing the problem of global warming, it was he with On Deadly Ground who did it first. Seagal's statement, in which he stressed how "hilarious" the situation is, may provoke one to wonder whether the actor, in this case, believes he is the one who deserves these accolades, rather than the Golden Raspberry he was awarded for On Deadly Ground.
