It was rumoured a while ago that Mark Whalberg may be the man to take on the adaptation of the hit videogame, Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune. Well now the actor has been talking to MTV and confirmed that he’s attached to the film, which David O’Russell will direct.
While Wahlberg didn’t have much luck with his last attempt to play a live action videogame character, Max Payne, you gotta hope that with O’Russell onboard – who Whalberg just worked with on The Fighter – they’ll come up with something interesting. The actor says, “David is one of the best writer/directors I’ve ever worked with. The idea that he has is just insane. So hopefully we’ll be making that movie this summer.”
There was also a rumour doing the rounds (first raised by Showbiz 411) that Uncharted was trying to reunite Robert De Niro and Joe Pesci, but most dismissed the idea as slightly absurd, especially as the film will be a big action-adventure. However Wahlberg says it’s true, although he can’t confirm they’ll actually end up doing it. He says, “I’m obviously in whatever David wants to do but the idea of it is so off the charts: De Niro being my father, Pesci being my uncle. It’s not going to be the watered-down version, that’s for sure.”
The Uncharted videogame follows a descendent of Sir Francis Drake, Nate Drake, a treasure hunter who thinks he has learned the whereabouts of El Dorado, the fabled golden city. As well as having to battle competing treasure seekers, he also has to do battle with mutated descendants of Spaniards and Nazis, who want to stop Nate getting to his goal. As the game was designed to feel like an Indiana Jones style big summer movie, it’s unsuprising Hollywood is itiching to get a film version into cinemas as soon as they can.