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After multiple false starts over the last 13 years, it appears that the Uncharted movie is finally about to start filming.
The news comes from lead actor Tom Holland’s Instagram, where he posted a photo of a chair with the word “Nate” on the back and the caption, “Day one #Uncharted”
Despite Holland’s implication that filming is underway, shooting hasn’t actually started just yet. But Tom did get a chair, so there’s progress.
The original rights to the video game action-adventure series were optioned back in 2007 and the project has slowly been cycling through directors ever since. David O. Russell, director of The Fighter and Silver Lining’s Playbook, was attached to direct the film with Mark Wahlberg set to play treasure-hunter Nathan Drake in 2010. Then came Limitless director Neil Burger, Horrible Bosses director Seth Gordon, and 10 Cloverfield Lane director Dan Trachtenberg, who all subsequently left the project.
The most recent departure was Bumblebee director Travis Knight, who left in early 2020. It seems that the current version of the film — the one that’s finally about to start filming — is headed by patron saint of troubled-Sony Pictures productions, Ruben Fleischer, director of Venom, and the Zombieland series — which had a sequel that took a decade to get off the ground.
Meanwhile, in the decade since he was first cast, Mark Wahlberg has aged from leading man Nathan Drake to his older friend and mentor, Sully. This may be partly due to a decision to set the whole story earlier in Drake’s life, which would make Sully a younger character as well. When Wahlberg moved to the Sully role, Sony replaced him with current Spider-Man, Tom Holland, who will play the young Nathan Drake.
In April, Sony shifted the movie’s release date from Oct. 8, 2021 to July 16, 2021 — a rare example of a movie getting moved up rather than delayed.
