Press release from Columbia Pictures...

 

David O. Russell (Three Kings, The Fighter) has been set to write and direct Columbia Pictures’ Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, an action-adventure based upon the bestselling PlayStation 3 game, it was announced today by Doug Belgrad and Matt Tolmach, presidents of Columbia Pictures. The film will be produced by Avi Arad, Charles Roven, Ari Arad, and Alex Gartner.

 

The story follows the adventures of treasure hunter Nathan Drake.

 

Commenting on the announcement, Tolmach said, “David is a tremendous choice to take on this film. He’s equally adept at combining all the classic elements involved in this property: great character development, strong comedy, and amazing action sequences. He has a brilliant vision for this material and we know he will bring his original, unique voice to this adaptation.”

 

The game, developed by the acclaimed team at Naughty Dog, was one of Sony Computer Entertainment’s best-selling and most critically acclaimed games for the PS3. Named IGN’s Best Action Game and Best PS3 Game, Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune sold one million copies in the first 10 weeks of its release at the end of 2007 on its way to moving more than 2.6 (confirm) million copies and spawning a sequel. That sequel, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves, was a major commercial and critical success, winning Game of the Year honors from several influential critics, being named the most critically acclaimed game of the year by Metacritic, and selling more than 3.8 million copies worldwide. Both games are among the all-time best-selling games for the platform.

 

The project will be overseen at Columbia Pictures by Tolmach and Jonathan Kadin.

This is a good choice of director and an indication that if they allow people other than Uwe Boll to translate video games, the films could actually be fun to watch and good movies in their own right.

 

Silent Hill and Mortal Kombat are, for me, the pinnacle of game-to-film translations.

Sounds great, both games are fantastic and made for movie versions.

Game movies are always gash though, Uncharted as great a game as it is, is still unbelievably cheesy when compared to anything other than a game. The best parts are the gameplay sections, not the story or the cut scenes.

Of course it's going to work, it's ripped off Indiana Jones and National Treasure enough to atleast be competent in theatre if not bland.

The idea is all they will take from the game and the idea is made for movies.

I love Uncharted, it is amazing and when I played it, I thought "Man this would make a really good movie."

Game movies are always gash though,

While the poor ones outnumber the good ones by quite a large margin, there are some that work well and are, at the very least, enjoyable.

 

For me, Mortal Kombat, Silent Hill, Prince of Persia and Resident Evil were really good, with Max Payne and Hitman being decent enough.

 

Basically, if you can keep Uwe Boll away from them, they turn out at least alright.

Mark Whalberg has been confirmed for the lead role.

De Niro and Pesci = gold.

Oh for f*ck sake. Marky Mark! I dont mind him but he isnt Nathan Drake in my eyes, his voice is completely wrong for a start.

As long as we get Claudia Black playing the bird who's voice she does then I'll be happy.

Nathan Fillion should've been cast instead of Wahlberg.

I like the idea of Mark being Drake. I think they made a great call there.