The roughest of Alaska's oil-rig roughnecks, Forrest Taft (Steven Seagal; also making his directorial debut) specializes in fighting oil-well fires. Yet he faces an even more incendiary battle against renegade Aegis Oil president Michael Jennings (Michael Caine). Aegis has put profits over environmental safety. And that puts Taft, a Native Alaskan activist (Joan Chen) and anyone else opposing the company on its hit list.

But Taft hits back, using the martial arts, survival and explosive skills he learned as a high-level CIA operative. Going one-on-one or one-on-20, Taft lets the Aegis bullyboys know where they stand: mess with the land he loves and they're On Deadly Ground.