Choke Canyon

Known as "On Dangerous Ground" in the UK.

A big nuclear company wants to take land (Choke Canyon) away from a peaceful scientist who is doing safe energy research work there to dumb radioactive waste. Obviously the peaceful guy isn't going to give them it. Nuclear guys will do anything to get rid of him, including killing him. Every one of the Nuclear companies goons come for him, but he dispatches them, even "Big" Bo Svensson, in typical 80s fashion.

Film gained a bit of notoriety in the 80s due to the theme song by Mike & The Mechanics "Silent Running (On Dangerous Ground)" being a hit in 1986. Song was more of a hit than the film. Tune is nowhere to be found in the movie though. Stunt work is great too. Check out the ending aerial joust with all the planes. Awesome.

Has a nice environmental message, which I always like too. Mildly recommended.

Park logic at the door, because the science behind the scientific experiments in "Choke Canyon" is ridiculous. The acting by everyone except Lance Henriksen is below average. Speaking of Lance, his part is not particularly well written, nor very important. In other words a waste of Henriksen. The only redeeming factor is some nice red rock photography, and some really wild and impressive stunt work. I really can't recommend sitting through all the nonsense that precedes the aerial acrobatics however. If the story had been more logical and better developed, this could have been a fairly decent film, but unfortunately that was not to be. Ah me! - MERK

This is a pretty standard low-budget actioner running just over 1 1/2h, it does have some points of interest: The cinematography is not bad, some cool helicopter action and the heroine Janet Julian is a looker. It is undemanding action fare, you can park your brain and kill 1 1/2h or so, I have seen it a couple of times, it's ok. 5/10

PS. The music video for Mike And the Mechanic's "Silent Running" is using scenes from this movie.

My review was written in July 1986 after watching the movie at a Times Square screening room.

"Choke Canyon" (a/k/a "On Dangerous Ground") is an entertaining action picture in the sci-fi genre which has too silly a script to be an outright success. Yeoman work by a talented film crew cannot overcome frequent dialog howlers and other unintentional wackiness.

Stephen Collins, dressing as if he were auditioning for a role in "Silverado", plays obstinate physicist David Lowell, experimenting on converting sound waves into usable energy, hopefully to solve the Earth's energy problems. He's calculated that the passing of Halley's Comet in April 1986 will create the maximum distortion of sound waves in Choke Canyon in Utah, at which time he will test his prototype machine there.

Though Lowell has a 99-year lease on the site, its owner Pilgrim Corporation is shipping nuclear waste to be dumped there. Fearint that Lowell, as a physicist, will make public its scheme, Pilgrim president John Pilgrim (Nicholas Pryor) orders him bought off. Lowell turns down the offer so Pilgrim sends for a hitman, the Captain (Bo Svenson, very funny in an exaggeration of the laconic tough-guy type). In a series of standoffs worthy of The Road Runner vs. Wile E. Coyote, Lowell keeps outwitting the Captain and sticking to his demands that Pilgrim replace his ruined equipment and remove the "black ball" (a huge container of nuclear waste plopped down in the canyon which makes the sound wave experiments too dangerous to conduct). Picture becomes truly nutty when Lowell doffs his Western garb, puts on a tux and crashes a party given by Pilgrim. He kidnaps Pilgrim's beautiful daughter (Janet Julian), insisting his demands be met before she is released. She's quickly won over to his cause and before the comet arrives and the experiment succeeds, they're chased all over the place by the Captain in a barnstorming biplane.

With Svenson reportedly doing all his own stunts, Chuck Bail (as stunt director in his own right) stages spectacular aerial craziness that exploits the beautiful locations near Moab, Utah (film is dedicated to its helicopter pilot and aerial coordinator, Richard R. Holley).

Cast plays it straight, but "Choke Canyon" nearly chokes on its dialog. Early on, a security guard gets slapped down by Svenson for examining the latter's high-powered rifle, and Bo mutters: "Never touch my things". This kind of double entendre pushes the film into campy territory instead of the suspenseful nail-biter it tries to be. Tech credits are all pro.

It's really difficult to explain why this movie is so unknown and low-rated. I've watched it many years ago, as a child, and now found it's DVD release at amazon.com. It's still really great! If you are the fan of 80's action movies - like e.g. Delta Force, American Ninja, Rambo, Commando or James Bond series - you certainly won't be disappointed by this one. This is a very well-done action thriller, with some great stunts and action sequences and - above all - fantastic score by Sylvester Levay (see also Cobra, but he is best known for his Airwolf theme). There are also some really good actors starring in "Choke Canyon", like Stephen Collins, Lance Henriksen and Bo Svenson whose performances make this movie really worth of seeing. So I recommend "Choke Canyon" (AKA "On dangerous ground") to all who like some good, old and light action thrillers.