Movie Number 9 of 2022
The Movie: Uncharted
Cinema: Hoyts Victoria Gardens
Stars: 3.5
I've found the near perfect, brainless, entertaining Friday night film. A film where you don't really need to engage your mind and just enjoy the unrelenting action. Uncharted is it. It ticks all the Friday night, post-work boxes. Pretty to look at. Tick. Unrealistic. Tick. Plot holes everywhere. Tick. Forgiven for it's flaws. Absolutely. I went to be entertained. I was entertained. Nobody's going to win an Oscar, and that is fine.
And then I find out this has been adapted from a video game - and all the problems with the plot make sense.
"Street-smart thief Nathan Drake (Tom Holland) is recruited by seasoned treasure hunter Victor "Sully" Sullivan (Mark Wahlberg) to recover a fortune lost by Ferdinand Magellan 500 years ago. What starts as a heist job for the duo becomes a globe-trotting, white-knuckle race to reach the prize before the ruthless Moncada (Antonio Banderas), who believes he and his family are the rightful heirs. If Nate and Sully can decipher the clues and solve one of the world's oldest mysteries, they stand to find $5 billion in treasure and perhaps even Nate's long-lost brother...but only if they can learn to work together."
It is that silly.
And a lot of fun.
What I liked about it was the action was good, clean and unrelenting. Not messed up torture, but lots of things blowing up.
Tom Holland brings his boyish charm as Nate, the poor orphan, deserted by his brother and left to fend for himself. He's a likable grifter, and the film needed this. His physicality is incredible. Mark Wahlberg does a good job as the grumpy Sully. And I really liked Tati Gabrielle (from The Chilling Adventures of Sabrina) as Braddock, the not so usual baddie after exactly what Nate and Sully are searching for.
It's also a pretty film to look at. The locations are amazing, from the back streets of Barcelona, to the bottom of Manhattan, to what is said to be The Philippines, but looks more like Thailand.
The acting is nothing more than you'd expect from an action film. I did take issue with Sophia Ali's hybrid British/Australian accent, which went from Hollywood to the Southern counties, to Byron Bay within any given sentence.
And there is a cat. Mr Whiskers. Gotta love a film with a cat.
As I said, the script and the plot are nothing to write home about, but I really enjoyed this, just because it was good, clean fun.
What more do you want on a Friday night after a hard week at work?
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