Movie critics weren’t overly keen on the Uncharted movie, but cinema goers are loving it. Over on Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a critics rating of just 39% approval, but it’s a certified hit among audiences: 90% of viewers recommend it. It’s a largely similar story on Google, where it currently commands a score of 4.2/5 – and on IMDB, it’s achieved a less stellar but still respectable 6.7/10 user score.
Of course, it was always going to be difficult to transition the Uncharted games – which are heavily inspired by adventure films like Indiana Jones – into something that universally appeals to critics. Sony Pictures won’t be too worried, of course: the movie is outperforming expectations, and looks on track to achieve an impressive cinematic run. On the back of blockbuster North American ticket sales, Forbes reported that it may have ended the video game curse – although, of course, Sonic the Hedgehog may have a word or two to say about that.
All eyes will now be on Uncharted’s performance as The Batman nears, and then ultimately whether a sequel gets the nod. It’s an encouraging start for PlayStation Productions, though, which is also bringing Ghost of Tsushima to the big screen – and betting big on its collaboration with HBO on The Last of Us.
[source rottentomatoes.com]
Comments 59
I almost never seem to be on the same page as movie critics these days so I can't say I'm surprised to see this.
I listen to professional reviewers for games, but for movies not so much. I tend to hate everything they love and vice versa.
Might give it a look now.. but man I want a new Uncharted GAME.. frickin love this franchise
Honestly Movie reviewers can be useless at times. Gaming reviews like on this site require a certain level of dedication and passion that is felt in the content. Movie reviewers however are hit or miss.
Echoing the above sentiments - I have little time for movie critics.
They tend to want to analyse a piece of art to death and tell me why it's not as good as The Departed.
Sometimes I just want popcorn and explosions.
I think a lot of folks are just looking for some escapist fun, that doesn’t necessarily have the word ‘Marvel’ associated with it, or 20 movies attached to it. Or maybe it’s just me… Really looking forward to seeing this and glad it’s being received well.
Videogame reviews in the aggregate are terrible. User reviews are more reliable because they are written by people who genuinely enjoy games. No doubt a lot of people who enjoyed the Uncharted movie gave it extra marks for being Uncharted, whereas most others just say it isn't as good as Indiana Jones.
The movie was decent, not everything needs to revolutionize cinema. Was a good way to spend a few hours on the weekend and honestly for me was no more or less entertaining than the games.
I'll normally take user reviews over critics. And if the two align then even better. I mean, HFW has 88% critic, 80% user. Uncharted, the movie about the movie game, has 47% critic and 66% user, and I see the users being about right.
If I remember right No Way Home is like 70% on meta but is pretty much universally loved and is at about 2bn in box office takings.
For years, I was super excited at the thought of getting an Uncharted movie, and potentially a franchise. Now that its here, I just don't have any interest in what they've done with it. I may watch it when its on a streaming service later, but my expectations are low. Holland and Marky Mark are just so wrong for the roles.
@thefourfoldroot I tend not to listen to people who got the product for free. I'd sooner listen to someone who spent their own money on it.
Huge Uncharted fan. No desire to see the movie, ever.
This is actually pretty normal for movies directed by Ruben Fleischer. Venom and Zombieland: Double Tap both have this same situation. The reality is that he can satisfy fans but can't move critics for whatever reason.
This is why I wish streaming apps and media information websites would show users ratings/freshness instead of the critics. In fact, I reckon Rotten Tomatoes should feature the users ratings as the main ratings.
@uptownsoul wasn’t there some kind of disagreement behind the curtains which lead to Tom (maybe others) refusing to promote the movie? I remember reading something about it ages ago and Tom said he hadn’t even seen the movie himself.
Edit: referring to Chaos Walking.
Movie critics are irrelevant, I usually just watch the movie trailers to see if I'm interested or not.
I feel like part of this is because there's a time and a place for bad films. I wouldn't go into this, or a Marvel film, expecting peak cultural enlightenment. It feels like critic reviews try to put a single score on films that reflects how they compare to every other film out there, and by that metric, these films deserve their low scores.
People who go to see these films, on the other hand, are looking for something big and dumb and joyful, which these films do great, and if they rate them for that, they're justified in getting a high score.
Without agreeing what metrics matter, there's always going to be disagreement, especially for what might be described as low-brow entertainment.
@Apfelschteiner "User reviews are more reliable because they are written by people who genuinely enjoy games"
Yeah, no. Someone who hasn't played the game can vote and give it a 0 out of spite or a 10, because he loves the company.
@Royalblues As I mentioned in another post, how many movies has he starred in that didn't flop and in which he didn't play Spiderman?
It's the same thing with most actors of popular movies/tv series. When they star in something and it's successful, it's attributed to their star power, acting like the other movies they starred in, which didn't do well, don't exist.
Wait, do we agree with user reviews on this article? So Horizon 2 is bad right?
@MattBoothDev
Unfortunately there are many user reviews, on metacritic for example, that are from people who never bought nor even played the games. Just sad fanboys. For movies it’s likely different.
Have no interest, maybe if Mark was playing Drake but Tom does nothing for me. Now The Batman is another beast entirely, I'm prepared to go to theaters for multiple viewings. Batman movies are a huge event in my family like Star Wars is for some.
Movie critics are garbage. They are wrong more then they are right.
@Royalblues his ‘Umbrella’ lip sync battle with Zendaya was amazing 🙌
Movie critics don’t take into account fun popcorn flicks as being good.
And this video game curse nonsense annoys me. Tomb Raider from a few years ago was a perfectly fine film. Assassin’s Creed was also ok and Sonic was excellent.
Its all opinions and the majority are nonsense
Critics completely out of touch with the public ?
Wow
Mind blown.
Movie critics have check boxes they need to mark in order to score a movie well. These days, many of those boxes are geared towards how "woke" a movie is. Uncharted has a straight white male in the lead role. They hate that in general so critics will automatically score it lower. I've found that critics also have zero sense of humor and Uncharted is known for its humorous moments and witty banter. That's going to lower its score even further.
So yeah... low critic scores mean it's probably a great movie with lots of fun parts. Pretty sure I'll enjoy it.
I mean, on one hand, critics always seem to come down too hard on fun, dumb action films and comedies, and will occasionally boost mediocre-to-bad films for ideological reasons (Ghostbusters 2016 has a higher critical score than Afterlife on RT, lol).
...on the other hand, audiences will sometimes also boost the scores of mediocre-to-bad films for ideological reasons (God's Not Dead and other terrible Christian propaganda films being good examples), give high ratings to films that are hard to defend (obnoxious Adam Sandler comedies like I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry come to mind), and come down hard on excellent films that aren't crowd-pleasers or were mismarketed (It Comes At Night).
The moral of the story? Just make up your own mind about what's good or bad.
@Shepherd_Tallon Well The Departed isn't even as good as Infernal Affairs which is what the film is a remake of. So if a critic is comparing something to The Departed then they clearly don't know their stuff
shang chi and black panther are the worst mcu films out there
critics love it though
@arra1213 worse than Iron Man 2, The Guardians films, and Eternals?!
Has the audience ever disliked a blockbuster film?
@kyleforrester87 User reviews on metacritic still place HFW at 80%. That's not a bad score.
Film critics watch films in order to seek flaws and critique them. We the people watch just for pure enjoyment. I expected far worse from this film due to my experience with games to film. I really enjoyed it. Though I’d have liked for the villain to come from the game and a better choice of actor for Sully.
"Of course, it was always going to be difficult to transition the Uncharted games – which are heavily inspired by adventure films like Indiana Jones – into something that universally appeals to critics."
...Bit of an odd statement to make, considering that the Indiana Jones series (setting aside the rebooted stinker of Crystal Skull) are beloved cinema classics with critic ratings of 95%, 84%, and 88% on Rotten Tomatoes.
@arra1213 Idk what you're on about if you think those are worse than Thor 2 and Captain Marvel at the very least.
Granted I know why some people hate those 2 in particular but I'd hate to assume.
I feel there is a difference between a GOOD movie and an ENTERTAINING one. While I haven't seen this yet I don't expect it to be good but I do expect it to be entertaining. Bit like a Jason Statham movie or a (name 80s/90s action hero) movie.
Bad movies can be hella fun but I wouldn't give them a good score.
So we’re listening to user reviews now? But not for Horizon Forbidden West? Calm down lads, your fanboy is showing.
Really enjoyed the movie, more than I thought I would. To be honest I think I prefer this particular I.P as a film franchise than a game franchise, it’s going to be so hard to go back and connect with game Nathan when he’s mowing down hundreds of henchmen with AK-47s. It’s pretty ridiculous for me to believe the guy has a heart of gold at that point, movie Nathan is a lot more believable.
Also, user reviews are pretty useless. Way too biased, and way too many 0’s and 10’s. Not saying I agree with the critics on this particular movie (I’d give it a solid 6.5), but I’d listen to them a thousand times before I gave the opinion of random neckbeard gamers or Adam Sandler loving moviegoers a second thought.
@Jimmer-jammer just wait until Uncharted was the start of the PlayStation cinematic universe. In a few years Ratchet is gonna pull Drake and the others into another dimension to help stop Dr Nefarious latest plan.
@Milktastrophe 😂 …at this rate we’ll eventually be seeing Mary Poppins and John Wick teaming up… 🎶 a clip full of lead will help the enemies go down 🎶
As long as Sony is at it, they should’ve filmed multiple takes with varying story paths. Turn it into the most interactively expensive FMV game ever! Erica, Dr. Decker, Poe and Munro…eat your hearts out!
As a complete 180, I had fun with the FMV game Bloodshore. Hope they make a sequel to that. Until then, I’ll go watch Uncharted in theaters and play through the Uncharted games again. Still need to finish up Uncharted 4. Jeez, I’m slacking. Eek!
I guess based on this comment section I was the only one that thought the movie was terrible
@Unlucky13 Wrong
It's good fun... & they're just fine once it's underway
With movies, I usually agree with the audience much more than critics. But from the trailers, I'm not fussed about going to to see this one. When it eventually appears on TV, I may give it a try.
Silent Hill - Critic: 32/Audience: 63
Resident Evil - Critic: 36/Audience: 67
Prince of Persia - Critc: 37/Audience: 58
Assassin's Creed - Critic: 18/Audience: 42
Warcraft - Critic: 28/Audience: 76
Resident Evil: WtRC - Critic: 31/Audience: 66
See a pattern there? The audience scores on these things are, almost universally, far higher than the critical scores.
@GeneJacket Your assertion is missing a control case - like, for example, the first six (non-video-game) movies in RT's "popular in theaters now" section:
Jack### Forever: 85/92
Moonfall: 38/69
Spider-Man NWH: 93/98
Scream: 77/81
Sing 2: 71/98
The King's Man: 42/80
Audiences and critics score all movies differently, not just game adaptations; you can almost think of movie critics grading on a 0-100 scale, while movie audiences grade on a 50-100 one (ironically more like video game reviewers often tend to!). Audience scores in the low 60's, like some of the legitimate stinkers you referenced, are bad.
That said, Uncharted's 39/90 is entirely decent by that scale, and not nearly as contentious a discrepancy as it looks like - by the conversion I proposed, a 39% critic score should correspond to right around a 70% audience score (or a 7/10 game score), which would be entirely unobjectionable. It's punching above its weight in audience reviews, then, but hardly by the night-and-day levels the raw scores would suggest, and not because of some critical conspiracy to underrate game movies.
@Cloud7794 thing about thor 2 and captain marvel, critics didnt hype it as masterpiece, so im not disppointed and lets be real here the action scenes in black panther is mediocre at best with mediocre acting, plot is mediocre with overused overthrown ruler,
i learned my lesson with these critics they hype these 2 films because its star an asian and black guy
Reviewers are pretentious and snooty especially in the movie realm of things, their word is as good as garbage most cases
I went to see it with the wife and kids at the weekend. It's not going to top Raiders of the Lost Ark, but it's a perfectly fun and watchable movie. All of us had a good time. Tom Holland isn't my idea of Nathan Drake and Mark Wahlberg isn't Sully to me either, but I thought the two actors bounced off each other pretty well. I learned not to listen to critics long ago, they rarely like the games, movies or music I like.
@Apfelschteiner I dont agree that user reviews are that great Metacritic shows us this every time with big triple A release.
Then again with movies reviewers somehow cant seem to understand that no every movie needs to be a new Shawshank.
@Flaming_Kaiser Imdb is pretty good for movies. Also, you have to consider that even if you don't agree with their reasons for not liking a movie/game a user still has legitimately disliked it and they are expressing their opinion. All games or movies are comparable with one another in that system. For sure there should be some statistical modelling to account for the anomalies
@Apfelschteiner I just dont agree with you want if you give a game like the Last of Us 2 or Horizon Forbidden West a zero you lose all credibility.
I would even go as far that games i really dispised like BF2042 or the release version of Cyberpunk are not a zero.
Please dont compare IMDB a quality site with something like Metacritic its just to much of a cesspool of fanboys. And a opinion is the same thing as a decent reason why something is a zero. Plus the amount of reviews of people just wanting to express the hate even when they havent even played the game.
If its a big franchise, platform exclusive, two girls kissing or whatever small thing its going to be reviewbombed.
sigh moviegoers are certainly a different market from myself these days. There's not a single thing in theaters/trailers in the past few months I would watch for free on a streaming service let alone pay box office tix for.
@Jimmer-jammer I'd pay money for that! That's the most beautiful sounding dark comedy ever!
I saw it and loved it. I rarely agree with the critics though. I guess I can see that there was probably nothing there that contributed to art or challenged me. But - I'm not sure that is why anyone goes to a movie...
I saw the movie when it first came out ir a fun movie to watch in 4DX 2D but Tom Holland is not Nate at all doesn't help the fact that he decided to change the character a bit as well. He acts like Peter Parker instead of Nathan Drake. Mark should of played Nate instead and the movie would be been better.
Problem with the critics is they've decided because Indiana Jones exists there can't be anything else like it. IMO I love the Indiana Jones movies and wish there were more from when Harrison Ford was at his peak. So any adventure film that remotely resembles those films is welcome in my eyes. Be interesting to see of they add supernatural elements in a sequel.
@Justjuzy he's a young Nate so maybe his character will evolve into the Nate from the games in sequels, you have to leave room for character development these days otherwise it's perceived as one-note. I think Tom Holland could play Drake later in life than he will Spider-man.
Question is who do they get to play his Brother? James Bell? Two Billy Elliott's would be funny
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