Uncharted 4K 2022 2160p Dolby Vision Ultra HD

A descendant of explorer Sir Francis Drake, treasure hunter Nathan Drake believes he has found the location of El Dorado, the coveted South American city of gold.

Uncharted 4K Review
God knows how many tears were shed by geeks after the release of another adaptation of the cult video game, but Ancharted fans were just as nervous in the tedious run-up to the premiere. The adaptation has been in development since the late '00s, but unsuccessfully. So much so that Mark Wahlberg, who was originally supposed to play Nathan Drake, has managed to grow old and get the role of an overgrown protégé Victor Sullivan (the actor has no distinctive mustache yet, but if the sequel still takes place, it is a matter of time). Ruben Fleischer went from being a zombie action director to directing "Venom", and the game itself moved from the shelf of the best-selling novelties to the box of timeless, but no longer the most relevant classics. It's not even about some of the inner mechanics of "Ancharted" - rather, the aesthetics of adventure thrillers a la "Indiana Jones" gave way to post-apocalyptic ("One of Us" from the same developers) or sci-fi.

And so the "Ancharted" adaptation does make it to the big screens. Tattered partly by time and partly by the studio bosses who held the film back for a better moment, it looks like an outsider even against the charmingly insane Emmerich's Falling Moon. It, too, is a gem from a bygone era of the '00s and early '10s, only everyone was waiting for it with an undisguised caustic irony: failure is unavoidable, but at least you can laugh at the silliness. Sally (Mark Wahlberg) and Drake (Tom Holland) set out to find the treasure of Magellan, while trying to outrun the villainous Moncada (Antonio Banderas). Secret passages in temples, ancient ships, traps and bird's-eye falls - you want to tell the story by describing the action and vivid details, not the scripted twists and turns.

However, was Ancharted itself ever the benchmark for writing? Within the genre and context - of course, but the original adventures of Sully and Drake were not loved for their epigone to "Indiana Jones" (or rather, not only for it). The Naughty Dog game fulfilled the desire of every teenage adventure movie fanatic to become a direct participant in an incredible action game - a charming treasure hunter with a stylish holster and a sharp tongue. Fleischer's "Ancharted," oddly enough, successfully captures the spirit of the original. There are even many scenes (falling from a cargo plane, solving mysteries in Spanish temples) copied directly from the video game, and those invented by the screenwriters themselves look quite in the style of the original.

The final, and the craziest, episode is quite original: the villains raise two giant ships in the air with helicopters, so that the next 20 minutes the heroes will be fighting on the flying ships - stand aside, "Pirates of the Caribbean". In the game, this scene would have felt very different, without the proper scale, mesmerizing general plans, and certainly no commensurate suspense: if Drake falls, you can't start from the same place, alas. The very denouement of Ancharted, in fact, is what justifies the existence of this movie - devoid of any sense of proportion, entertaining and hilarious to the point of not being in the characters' shoes, but simply observing their adventures from aside.

"Ancharted" can hardly be called a conventional video game adaptation at all: too little fanservice, too many jokes that change the rules of the game on the fly. Mark Wahlberg (the best thing about this film) peeks out of hiding during all the action scenes like a jack-in-the-box. Antonio Banderas, seemingly not changing his costume from filming a perfume commercial, wandered onto the set of "Ancharted" in between. Everything here is ridiculous but strikingly vivid: either Fleischer has remembered his best years, or Covid has just taught us to appreciate studio cinema, which has some spark of wackiness in it.

And even Holland's casting, which at first was frightening in its marketing and lack of character, turns out to be justified. He really isn't Drake - at least at first. The new "Anchorman" pulls a clever trick and makes the typical idealist who wants to fix the world ("Spider-Man: No Way Home") into a true scrounger, thief and adventurer. Hollywood movies have taught us that higher ideals must be aspired to. Fleischer's film, of course, agrees, but inserts one "but": the main thing is to keep your ears open, keep an eye on your partners and be prepared for everyone to sell you out for a piece of gold.