Spoiler-Free Thoughts On “Uncharted”
Posted on May 22, 2022 Posted by Athena Scalzi 12 Comments
Mark Wahlberg and Tom Holland look at something intently in “Uncharted.”
Hello, everyone! Now that we’ve gotten the long, emotional post that always comes with returning to the site out of the way, I can start doing my reviews and recommendations and whatnot! For the summer’s first review, I’ve decided to go into uncharted waters and review a video-game movie.
Before I begin this review, I think it’s important to mention that I have never actually played, or even knew anything about, the Uncharted video game series. I tend to avoid trailers as much as possible because I feel that trailers nowadays give absolutely everything away and leave nothing for the film. From what little I had heard and seen before going to see it, I figured Uncharted would be a lot like a Tomb Raider movie: lost treasures, perilous situations caused by trying to retrieve said treasure, and lots of fighting and guns.
And I was correct! Uncharted is an action-packed, celebrity-studded, predictable, and somewhat goofy movie. I actually quite enjoyed it! I’m sure it helped that I went in with low expectations; not everything has to be a hard-hitting, emotional, super deep story that wins Oscars. It’s okay to just put a movie on, eat popcorn, and watch people punch each other.
The characters were fun to watch interact with each other, in a two-dimensional, you’re-here-for-explosions-and-fighting way. I liked Tom Holland’s performance as the lead character, Nathan Drake, and I especially enjoyed the dynamic between his and Mark Wahlberg’s character, Sully. They had an entertaining back and forth, with constant witty jabs at each other. Their characters aren’t the only ones that deserve a mention, though, for there are some killer femme fatale characters (played by Sophia Taylor Ali and Tati Gabrielle) that will immediately make you want to start keeping a dagger strapped to your thigh at all times.
As mentioned before, this movie was highly predictable, and that’s coming from someone who is usually super oblivious to plot twists. People often say, “I saw it coming from a mile away,” and I finally got a chance to feel that way with Uncharted. Not just once, but three times!
The special effects were impressive. Everything looked quite realistic, and as I mentioned before, the main thing I hoped to see in this movie was good special effect explosions and the like, so I really enjoyed this aspect of the film. There were a couple shots that were clearly made for the 3D version of the film, which looked a bit awkward in regular 2D. That took away from the sense of immersion.
Uncharted was a helicopter-heisting, stolen-ship-sailing, treasure-trove-tracking movie, and I was totally here for it. If you can keep your expectations in check, I recommend this movie.
If you’ve played the game and seen the movie, how did it stack up? If you only saw the movie, what did you think? Let me know in the comments and have a great day!
-AMS
I had no idea about the video game connection when I saw this movie; I just wanted a fun adventure movie to hit at a matinee for our first foray back into the world of attending a movie in a theater.
I found it much the same as you did. It was a romp. Sometimes the dialogue was a little stiff, and some of the suspension -of-disbelief moments were a little … er … non-suspensiony. But overall it was fun and worth a matinee or a date evening streaming at home.
I went into it knowing nothing, and while it was simple and brainless I do have to admit that I loved the final action sequence.
Sounds like my type of movie! Thanks for the review.
I’ve only messed around with demos a bit, so can’t really compare it to the game other than by hearsay, but it achieves at least one thing, confirmation (along with the Sonic movies) that being based on a game is no longer the kiss of death. It wasn’t a great movie, but it was fun and not even in the B- cult movie way stuff like Mortal Kombat barely managed to achieve. Maybe, just maybe, it’s OK to stop fearing game based movies?
I had an absolute blast with this movie, and this is coming from an avid fan of the video games. Oddly enough, just watched it last night.
I appreciated the nods towards the franchise while not being bound by it. It was good silly fun.
While I did find myself declaiming that such-and-such was infeasible and that-and-that was illogical: I found myself laughing at the same time.
Solid and enjoyable popcorn fodder.
First off, let me say that the games are some of my favorites. So keeping that in mind the movie IMHO wouldn’t be that bad when separated from the game if it weren’t for Mark Wahlberg. For me he killed the movie. He wasn’t even trying to channel the character from the game. He was just being himself. Holland wasn’t bad as a younger Nathan Drake. But he’s not enough to save the movie.
I never played the game, but I did enjoy the movie. It was a fun popcorn sort that gives one a couple hours away from the real world. I personally thought the pairing of Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg worked very well. I’d like to see them come back for another installment. Fingers crossed.
I played the games and yes, they were clearly inspired by Indiana Jones and Tomb Raider. Having played them, I recognized a few of the movies scenes from the games.
Did I like the movie? It has a battle between two pirate-air-ships firing cannons at each other. If that doesn’t sound like fun to you, I dunno what will. Mmm, maybe adding some dinosaurs, Tomb Raider style.
I have yet to see “UNCHARTED” but I’ve seen enough trailers and snippets to know it’s definitely my kind of thing. One very large Point Of Improbability does stick out though. The Sikorski Skycrane helicopters shown can lift about ten tons each, a huge amount for a helicopter, but those galleons weighed hundreds of tons and would fall apart before they even got airborne, even if they had somehow lasted centuries without rotting to bits.
Andy Carrein, amen! EVERY movie could do with dinosaurs, even the Jurassic Park and World series, MORE dinosaurs in their case…
Okay; I was up in the air on this one. I also have never played the game but do enjoy the genre; so I’ll go ahead and spend a buck to get this from RedBox next rainy night I have no other plans.
Well – while I like videogames, I don’t have much time (or skill) to play them often – or well.
…. But… I have played the last Uncharted… And finished! (Honestly, have only finished 4-5 videogames ever)
So – while there were some switch-ups on the archetype of characters and their subsequent actor choices (I didn’t feel MarkW was a good fit), overall I felt the movie definitely captured the feel of the game.
And it was fun, predictable – but alot of fun.