Surviving The Game is a great action movie inspired by the short story The Most Dangerous Game. The film is very similar to John Woo/JCVD flick Hard Target that was released a bit before this. Hard Target has more to offer as far as non stop action craziness, but in my opinion Surviving The Game is a better film. Ice T does a good job as the lead in the movie. He plays Mason, a homeless man who lives on the streets of Seattle. He gets a break (or so he thinks) by getting a gig as a survival guide for a hunting party of rich guys on vacation in the wooded mountains of The American Northwest. It ends up being a game of survival by a bunch of sociopaths where Ice T must utelize his street survival skills in the woods as he now is hunted for sport. This group of affleunt hunters is lead by by Rutger Hauer in one of his finest and most sinister performances. His tight bro and wingman, Charles S Dutton is impressive as well and is also rounded out by outstanding performances from Gary Busy and John C McGinley. The pace is quick, the locations look great, story and character development is solid and packed with action and memorable, great performances.

I rated this G-awful turkey a 1 just to try to get its rating down to about where it belongs - a 2 or 3 at best! Unbelievable that such high caliber actors would take part in such a cinematic mess - they must have been paid well or desperate for something to do. Normally only a bunch of unknowns would act in such a turkey. The events and actions portrayed are absolute nonsense and totally unrealistic - did anyone with half a brain read the script before shooting began? Could have been much better with a better script.SPOILER: One of the biggest nonsense parts (towards the end) was how the heck did Mason (Ice_T) get back to civilization when he was stranded in the middle of nowhere AND IN ONLY 3 DAYS! Just one of the MANY ridiculous story elements.Don't waste your time with this.

I fell in love with this film from the first time i saw it. I'm a massive Ice-T fan and it was the first film i'd ever seen him in. I thought he was great and i was rooting for him the whole way through the story. There are a few classic scenes e.g. Gary Busey telling Ice-T how he got his birthmark, and Ice-T has a few cheesy one-liners. All this makes the movie a cult classic for me. If you liked Hard Target, you'll love Surviving The Game. Okay, Ice-T is obviously not the greatest actor, but his performance here is actually very good. It's all meant to be a bit cheesy anyway! McGinlay, Dutton and especially Busey all did well with their reasonably small roles. Hauer is, as usual, brilliant. So if you like your guns, motorbikes, fights and trees... you're in luck. 10/10

The "manhunt" action/suspense premise may perhaps be nearly as old as cinema itself, but it's also one that practically always guarantees a bloody good time! I've seen several film versions of the hunting-humans concept and loved them all; except for one (the abominable 60's bore "Bloodlust!"). Irving Pichel and Ernest B. Schoedsack's original 30's classic "The Most Dangerous Game" undoubtedly remains the greatest version, but I particularly love how there exist numerous variations on the theme, like an excessively violent one set on a futuristic prison island ("Blood Camp Thatcher") or a super-sleazy one where they exclusively hunt scarcely dressed girls (Eddie Romero's "The Woman Hunt"). "Surviving the Game" is a rather rudimentary re-working of the premise, but nonetheless a very effective one with a downright awesome cast listing and a handful of genuine shocks. Jack Mason is an embittered and suicidal homeless man who loses his last will to live when both his dog and best friend in one day. The sly businessman Thomas Burns lures Mason to the wilderness with a false job promise, but instead he and his maniacal rich friends simply intend to hunt down Mason like an animal and kill him for sports. Mason may be suicidal, but he still wants to decide for himself when he dies, and so he successfully fights back. "Surviving the Game" is quite a gruesome and nihilistic-toned film; definitely not for people with vulnerable stomachs. The violence is pretty gratuitous and served without any form of morality, but what else do you expect from a B-movie. As indicated above, the film's main trump is the cast and particularly because each and every cool actor depicts a marvelously eccentric character. I can't even pick a favorite performance between F. Murray Abraham (as a sinister Wall Street big shot), Gary Busey (as an out-and-out deranged FBI psychiatrist), the overacting John C. McGinley (as a frustrated hunter with a vengeance) or of course Rutger Hauer as the mega-bastard. Ernest Dickerson – formerly a skilled cinematographer – does an admirable job directing his first long feature and he went on making the vastly entertaining Tales from the Crypt movie "Demon Knight". The forestry filming locations are impressive, the story doesn't contain any dull or unnecessary padding sequences and the level of suspense is continuously kept high. I don't know about you but that's everything I look for in an action movie.