Adventure movies have always been a staple of Hollywood studios since the beginning of cinema. Directors like David Lean, Robert Zemeckis, Howard Hawks and Ridley Scott, to name a few, have made a name for themselves making adventure films. More often than not, such films have a basis in reality. They’re either based on first person accounts or adapted on fictionalised versions of events that actually took place. Such films give the directors a chance to explore the wild and hence contain great photography. Cinematographers relish going out of the studios and setting their camera in the great unknowns, capturing the wild haunting beauty of the outdoors. One can say that nature, in essence, becomes the central character in many such films. They chronicle the efforts of man pitted against the harshness of nature. Such films showcase the resilience of human spirit, where men and women are tested to the limits of their endurance. It’s not to say that they don’t contain human drama. Man is at his most violent outside of civilization. It’s where the darkness of the human heart comes into play. He becomes one with the animals and his true face exposes itself. Such films also take us back into the past and acquaint us with the struggles of our ancestors. We get to see sights unknown and get to live and breathe dangers that we’ll never face in our everyday lives. So, buckle up the seatbelt of your armchairs and scroll down our list of some of the best adventure films to have come out of Hollywood in the last decade.
The Way Back (2010)
Director: Peter Weir
Cast: Jim Sturgess, Ed Harris, Saoirse Ronan, Colin Farrell
The film is based on The Long Walk by Sławomir Rawicz. When the Soviets forcefully extract a confession from his wife that he’s a spy, Janusz (Jim Sturgess) finds himself in a remote Siberian labor camp. Faced with brutal conditions inside and out, Janusz is determined to escape. A blizzard provides him with the perfect opportunity, and he and a small group of fellow prisoners Mr. Smith (Ed Harris), an American engineer; Khabarov (Mark Strong), an actor; Valka (Colin Farrell), a hardened Russian criminal; Tomasz (Alexandru Potocean), a Polish artist; Voss (Gustaf SkarsgÃ¥rd), a Latvian priest; Kazik (Sebastian Urzendowsky), a Pole suffering from night blindness; and Zoran (DragoÈ™ Bucur), a Yugoslav make a break for it. Escape, however, is the easy part, for Janusz and his companions face a 4,000 mile trek on foot through the frozen landscape before they can truly be free.
Life Of Pi (2012)
Director: Ang Lee
Cast: Suraj Sharma, Irrfan Khan, Rafe Spall, Tabu, Adil Hussain, and Gérard Depardieu.
This adventure film is based on Yann Martel's 2001 novel of the same name. After deciding to move to Canada, PI’s parents board a Japanese freighter with their sons and the animals they own. A terrible storm sinks the ship, leaving the Patels' teenage son, Pi (Suraj Sharma), as the only human survivor. After the storm, Pi awakens in the lifeboat with the zebra and is joined by a resourceful orangutan. A spotted hyena emerges from under a tarpaulin covering half of the lifeboat and snaps at Pi, forcing him to retreat to the end of the boat. The hyena kills the zebra and later the orangutan. Richard Parker emerges from under the tarpaulin, killing the hyena before retreating back to cover for several days. As days turn into weeks and weeks drag into months, Pi and the tiger must learn to trust each other if both are to survive. The film also is a parable about human needs and desires and also comments on human depravity.
The Grey (2012)
Director: Joe Carnahan
Cast: Liam Neeson, Frank Grillo, Dermot Mulroney, Dallas Roberts, Joe Anderson, Nonso Anozie, James Badge Dale
The film is based on the book Ghost Walker by Ian MacKenzie Jeffers. John Ottway (Liam Neeson) is a marksman for an oil company in Alaska, killing grey wolves that threaten the drillers. On his last day on the job, he sees a wolf pursuing a driller and shoots it, listening to the wolf’s final breath. That evening, Ottway writes a letter to his wife, Ana (Anne Openshaw), explaining his plans to complete suicide, but does not follow through. The next day, he accompanies the workers flying home but the plane carrying them crashes due to a sudden storm. The only way to survive is to trek across the wilderness. As they walk toward civilization, Ottway and his companions must battle mortal injuries, the icy elements, and a pack of hungry grey wolves.
Black Sea (2014)
Director: Kevin Macdonald
Cast: Jude Law, Konstantin Khabensky, Scoot McNairy, Ben Mendelsohn, David Threlfall
Soon after losing his salvage job, former naval officer Robinson (Jude Law) assembles a misfit crew of unemployed British and Russian sailors for a risky mission. They’re to find a sunken Nazi U-boat, rumored to contain a fortune in gold. They travel to the Port of Sevastopol and acquire an antiquated Foxtrot-class submarine. Promising each man an equal share, Robinson leads the mixed British and Russian crew to comb the depths of the Black Sea. They do succeed in finding the sunken gold and salvaging it from the U-boat. But, greed takes hold of a crew already divided along language and cultural lines. And, they’re also facing treachery at the hands of Robinson’s former bosses, as also the Russian Navy.
Everest (2015)
Director: Baltasar Kormákur
Cast: Jason Clarke, Josh Brolin, John Hawkes, Robin Wright, Emily Watson, Keira Knightley, Sam Worthington, Jake Gyllenhaal
The film is inspired by true events. Baltasar Kormákur directed the film, about the 1996 disastrous expedition to scale Mount Everest, which was scripted by Simon Beaufoy and Mark Medoff. On the morning of May 10, 1996, climbers from two expeditions, including Rob Hall (Jason Clarke), who popularized commercial Everest missions, leads Adventure Consultants; Scott Fischer (Jake Gyllenhaal) is the chief guide for its rival, Mountain Madness. Rob's clients include Beck Weathers (Josh Brolin), an experienced climber; Doug Hansen (John Hawkes), a former mailman pursuing his dream; climbing veteran Yasuko Namba (Naoko Mori), who hopes to complete her final Seven Summits ascent; and Outside magazine journalist Jon Krakauer (Michael Kelly) started their final ascent toward the summit of Mount Everest, the highest point on Earth. With little warning, a violent storm strikes the mountain, engulfing the adventurers in one of the fiercest blizzards ever encountered by man. Challenged by the harshest conditions imaginable, the teams must endure blistering winds and freezing temperatures in an epic battle to survive against nearly impossible odds.
The Revenant (2015)
Director: Alejandro G. Iñárritu
Cast: Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hardy, Domhnall Gleeson, Will Poulter
This gritty film is based on the book The Revenant by Michael Punke. Forest guide Hugh Glass (Leonardo DiCaprio) guides Captain Andrew Henry's (Domhnall Gleeson) trappers through hostile territory. While he and his half-Pawnee son, Hawk (Forrest Goodluck), are hunting, the company's camp is attacked by an Arikara war party which is seeking to recover its Chief's abducted daughter, Powaqa. Many of the trappers are killed during the fight Guided by Glass, the survivors travel on foot to Fort Kiowa. Glass sustains life-threatening injuries from a brutal bear attack. When trapper John Fitzgerald (Tom Hardy) wants to kill him, he’s interrupted by Hawk. Hawk is then killed by Fitzgerald, who believes that Glass has also died. But Glass isn’t dead and swears revenge. He somehow survives and utilising all his hunting and tracking skills, reaches the fort where Fitzgerald is hiding to exact his revenge.
The Lost City Of Z (2017)
Director: James Gray
Cast: Charlie Hunnam, Robert Pattinson, Sienna Miller, Tom Holland, Angus Macfadyen, Ian McDiarmid, Franco Nero
It’s based on the 2009 book of the same name by David Grann and portrays real events surrounding the British explorer Percy Fawcett (Charlie Hunnam), who was sent to Brazil and made several attempts to find a supposed ancient lost city in the Amazon. He does discover evidence of a previously unknown, advanced civilization that may have once inhabited the region. Despite being ridiculed by the scientific establishment, which views indigenous populations as savages, the determined Fawcett, supported by his devoted wife, son, and aide-de-camp, returns to his beloved jungle in an attempt to prove his case. He’s later reported missing, and presumed to be dead. However, his wife believes he’s living with the Amazonian tribes and vows to follow him.
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