Reviews
Uncharted 3
Andy Robertson
The Insatiable Moon
Directed by Rosemary Riddell
Certificate 15, 97 minsĀ, DVD
Something is happening in Auckland’s suburb of Ponsonby. Arthur,
the Second Son of God (Rawiri Paratini), has only to snap his
fingers for pedestrian traffic lights to turn from green to red. On
finding a $100 bill, he cheerfully rips it and gives one half each
to two people in expectation that the two halves will be reunited.
Which subsequently miraculously happens. Like many mentally ill
people, he hears voices. In Arthur’s case, the voice of God his
Father. ‘We get them all here,’ says his down-to-earth, local
boarding house manager Bob (Greg Johnson), ‘Elvis, Napoleon, the
Pope.’ Yet Arthur seems to be different: there’s nothing unusual in
his borrowing $20 from the local vicar (Jason Hoyte), plenty
unusual in his paying it back the next day.
Bob, meanwhile, gets shopped to a petty health and safety
bureaucrat by a developer trying to buy up Bob’s property which Bob
has no intention of selling. A local TV reporter picks up the
story, which soon becomes more controversial. One of Bob’s
residents, John (Mick Innes), is a convicted paedophile. We see him
loitering momentarily outside the window of some small girls before
running off. Elsewhere, we see Arthur praying for him. Then John
hangs himself. Meanwhile, the social services worker Margaret (Sara
Wiseman), obsessed with having kids with her infertile and
disengaged husband, becomes intrigued and then infatuated with
Arthur.
The Insatiable Moon has been rightly lauded as an independent New
Zealand gem. In adapting the screenplay from his own novel, the
writer and producer Mike Riddell deftly walks a magical realist
path whereby Arthur could well genuinely be the Second Son of God
but could equally be simply a mentally ill person who hears voices.
He prays and things happen, but that could be coincidence. One
scene that gives particular credibility to Arthur’s divine nature,
however, is when the mother of a girl John killed years ago turns
up to protest at his funeral, and Arthur manages to console
her while paying tribute to the memory of his friend – a remarkable
feat of justice and mercy both for Arthur and for the Riddells. It
asks us the compelling question, what reason do we have to assume
that the Son of God would not come as a person with mental health
problems?
The film takes mental illness entirely seriously, but without
solemnity. It treats its characters not as issues but as
three-dimensional people with stories that are funny, poignant and
endearing, and well worth hearing.
All this is bought a life by a terrific cast, ably directed by
Rosemary Riddell, who is married to Mike. With the film’s charm and
love of quirky characters, one is reminded of that other terrific
husband and wife team film-making team from down under, Nadia Tass
and David Parker (Malcolm, Mr. Reliable). The sensitively-handled,
religious subject matter of The Insatiable Moon, however, marks it
out as something very different in the world of international film
production. If its messianic and sexual content have the potential
to upset some, that probably isn’t so different from the story of
the First Son of God.
Uncharted 3: Drake’s Deception
Naughty Dog Games
Videogames aren’t famous for telling stories. They prefer to
engage the player with agency and interaction. Uncharted 3:
Drake’s Deception folds this premise back on itself in an
effort to combine storytelling and action. The result is a game
that is about more than shooting, clambering and saving the
world.
Uncharted 3 is the third in a series of games that
follow an Indiana Jones-style protagonist as he shoots, climbs and
fisticuffs his way through all sorts of locations to stop a
variety of evil villains, each of whom want to use magical
artefacts to rule the world. In the videogame world this is pretty
standard stuff. It’s visually impressive, has a full orchestral
soundtrack and needs a high degree of skill (and a good 15 hours)
to finish it. This much you would expect.
What you might not expect is that the scenes that appear between
the action are fully acted in front of a blue-screen stage, as if
for a film. This makes the game as enjoyable to watch as it is to
play, something that makes Uncharted 3 stand out from its
peers. It leans on both interactive and non-interactive moments to
engage the player, rather than focusing on the former at the
expense of the latter.
Although this muddying of the videogame waters with cinematic
ambitions limits what Uncharted might have been in purely
gaming terms, such is the commitment to the idea by developer
Naughty Dog that the result is an interactive experience that
offers more emotional engagement than we expect from a
videogame.
It’s an approach that leads to an unusual question not asked
often enough about videogames. What is this experience about?
Uncharted 3 answers this question surprisingly succinctly
as it presents an intelligent, if flawed, study of its infallible
hero Nathan Drake.
Like modern Bond films that are no longer able to bear the
weight of James’ unquestionable confidence in himself, his mission
and his country, Uncharted 3 pokes holes in Nathan’s
unflinching belief in his own ability.
‘What are you trying to prove?’ asks Chloe, one of his female
companions. ‘Why Nate, why this obsession?’ asks Elena, who knows
him better than most with their implied failed marriage since
Uncharted 2.
Both Chloe and Elena make the same point though: Nate has an
unhealthy drive to win no matter the cost to him or those around
him – friend or foe. This is underlined painfully when Nate all too
easily agrees to call Elena in to help, valuing what she can offer
the mission over any feelings he has for her, or her personal
safety.
While hints of a broken home and self-sufficient childhood tell
us more about Nate than we know about Bond’s upbringing,
Uncharted 3 wisely stops short of joining up these dots.
It’s left for the character who has known Nate the longest, since
rescuing him from life on the streets, to lay it on the line for
him at the end of the game: Sullivan leans in close and says in an
uncharacteristically sombre tone, ‘Just stop being a wise arse for
one second. Real greatness is what you do with the hand you’ve been
dealt.’ With half an eye on Elena in the background, Sullivan is
clear that people are as important as artefacts in this
equation.
Unlike a book or a film where we are unable to observe all this
as an onlooker, being a game makes these moments all the more
uncomfortable. It is our actions that drive Nate forwards, that
steer him headlong into whatever doom the story demands. We may not
be in control of the destination but we inevitably take some of the
responsibility for arriving at it. We could after all stop playing
at any point – but like Nate find ourselves driven to complete the
story no matter how many henchmen have to pay the ultimate price
for our heroism.
However, this strength is also Uncharted‘s weakness.
Alongside the exchanged glances and dialogue that ask unnerving
questions about our protagonist’s mental state, the gameplay often
seems forgetful of such substantial gains. Even when lost in the
desert for days there is no hint of self-doubt or fear, more of
inconvenience. Nate meets each insurmountable obstacle – hanging
from a plane, escaping a sinking ship or just dispatching the next
round of enemies – with unflinching stoic determination.
If the gameplay allowed for even a scattering of moments where
Nate refused to go on, or was simply debilitated by doubt it would
feel more coherent. Forgiving this is possible though, because the
nature of the gameplay itself is more than something to get us from
one plot point to the next. Taking the reins turns the hero from a
two dimensional character into a real person. In a different way to
books or cinema Nate, Chloe, Elena and Sullivan feel
real.
Because you control the action it becomes a story you have
ownership of. While this doesn’t make me comfortable with the
violence in Uncharted 3 or enable me to forgive the lack of
narrative follow from the gameplay, I find myself involved in a
more intimate manner than other media allow.
This was evident in a number of ways but none more so than how
much the game’s conclusion mattered. Not whether Nate won or lost,
but whether he was able to admit his shortcomings and start to
change. Would Nate realise that the real deception here was not
that of his nemesis Marlow but a trick he had pulled on
himself?
As the credits roll and the orchestra strike up Nate’s Theme, an
exchange of rings hints that this isn’t the end of the story. The
ring that led him into this hunt for treasure and revenge is lost
and one that ties him to a much more human commitment is gained. It
seems there is hope for Nate and Elena yet, and that is a much more
important and emotional moment than I expected it to be.
Andy Robertson
www.gamepeople.co.uk