The successful Uncharted series (2007-2016) are some of the most movie-ready video games for big screen adaptation. While playing the globe-trotting, puzzle-solving, treasure-hunting action-adventures, it feels very much like you’re already in the middle of a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster. The game was in development for so long that the producers have finally ditched Nathan Fillion, the celebrity doppelganger in look and attitude of the game’s swashbuckling protagonist Nathan Drake, and resorted to everyone’s favorite web-slinger Tom Holland as a younger version of the hero. He’s a brainy bartender who is looking for some hidden Magellan treasure, and maybe his missing older brother too, and is aided by Victor “Sully” Sullivan (Mark Wahlberg), an Army vet with a shared goal of retrieving the gold before his rival, wealthy industrialist Santiago (Antonio Banderas). It’s a race against time and while it doesn’t reinvent the action-adventure wheel, Uncharted is a perfectly diverting piece of entertainment. The banter is fun between Holland and Wahlberg, the action set pieces are brisk, and the third act in particularly is just a showstopper of big action bravado. The visuals are eye-grabbing and the action sequences are inventive and exciting. That’s what Uncharted gets the most right, that sense of fun the games have built into their core, while keeping things moving smoothly with colorful characters and large-scale action. You’ve seen some combination of this movie before, but even genre masterpieces are built from their influences, so being derivative is not a fatal flaw as long as the filmmakers get the essentials of storytelling and action cinema right, and they do here. The world of video game movies is already one where the bar is fairly low for quality, but it seems like Hollywood has started raising its game, like with the new Tomb Raider, Detective Pikachu, Sonic the Hedgehog, and the upcoming Last of Us prestige HBO series. Count Uncharted as the Saturday morning popcorn spectacle that knows exactly how to deliver a good time in only 105 minutes.

Nate’s Grade: B