Uncharted

By Jonah Naplan

February 18, 2022

History has often told that video game movies do not tend to be good. I enjoyed “Pokemon Detective Pikachu” and “Sonic the Hedgehog,” but even so, the genre mostly falls with a thud in my mind. Ebert once said that video games can never be art, although I don’t always agree. As long as a film has an engaging plot and interesting characters, it doesn’t matter what its source material is. And according to people who have actually played the “Uncharted” games, Nathan Drake has made the medium closer to art than it has ever been. I haven’t played them myself, but I can guarantee that Ruben Fleischer’s movie adaptation does not live up to its household name.

“Uncharted,” reminiscent of every action/adventure movie ever made, stars Tom Holland and Mark Wahlberg as Nathan Drake and Victor Sullivan. They are attempting to find the “greatest treasure never found” using two ancient crosses. But of course, a rich guy by the name of Santiago Moncada (Antonio Banderas) stands in the way of their destination, Banderas, who is only in the movie for about four or five scenes. Movies like “Uncharted” usually appeal to an exclusive demographic; people who can handle and enjoy dumb action.

I usually can, but I don’t know, nothing about the action in “Uncharted” was all that special to me. It just felt like a copy and paste of the most generic parts of each Indiana Jones movie, somewhat held together by a few charismatic actors. It’s all professionally made after all, but the green screen is obvious, and Holland and Wahlberg don’t seem to have any chemistry. Most of the actors don’t seem to understand that a movie such as “Uncharted” should be fun. It should have heart and soul, and jokes every so often. “Uncharted” attempts to have all of these things, but when the funniest joke in your movie is Mark Wahlberg mindlessly walking into a Papa John’s, something is definitely wrong.

Because I’m unfamiliar with the “Uncharted” lore, it’s difficult for me to identify whether the fanbase will be satisfied with the movie. Some people have criticized that Holland has been miscast as Nathan Drake, and that he’s too young for the part. It didn’t make all that big of a difference to me, but I feel like Tom Holland keeps playing the same role over and over and over again: a quirky, charming, and determined young lad who often teams up with an older persona; Drake being another new addition to this ongoing list. Holland is a charming actor, so I just wish he would branch out more often. Sure, he did “Cherry” last year, but it was not a critical success, and many claimed his character was played at a dramatic level of over-acting. 

There’s an interesting dynamic between our two leads and Sophia Ali inside of the film. Ali keeps things interesting, especially during the second act, when some twists and turns occur. In some ways, a cinematic trio can work better than a duo, because there’s more substance to work with and these characters are surprisingly well-developed for a video game movie. While we aren’t that interested in the plot itself, the characters are charming enough for the film to get by. In other words, without our leads, the film could have been much worse.

The action sequence at the end of “Uncharted” is so absurd, that it was easy for me to just sit back in my recliner and watch some cheesy cinema. Is the green screen obvious? Of course it is. But film often has a strategy of drawing me in anyway. While much of the action is traditional, and the storytelling is predictable, it’s still an action film in the genre in which I so enjoy.

The extent of originality that “Uncharted” has to offer isn’t much, but I found that it was fun enough to not seem like a complete waste of my time. I’m interested to see what more fans of the video games think of it; I assume they’ll enjoy it as an action flick, but not as an epic “Uncharted” adaptation. The name of Tom Holland is sure to draw more average moviegoers to the theater, but his Nathan Drake doesn’t seem skilled enough to be the intrepid adventurer he’s said to be. With its generic plotlines, “Uncharted,” is really just more “meh,” than bad. 

Letting out a sigh after the first scene, I was already checked out. And that’s all this adaptation really is. Not bad, just one big adventurous sigh of a film.