Ender’s Game

Great Cast, A Decent Book to Movie Adaptation
For those purchasing Ender’s Game on Blu-Ray, here are the special features: Aside from the iTunes Digital Download and Ultraviolet Downloads; you get audio commentary from the director, Gavin Hood; an “Inside the Mind Game” featurette; a Behind the Scenes Making of “Ender’s Game” called “Ender’s World,” and deleted/extended scenes with optional audio commentary from Hood.Now on to my movie review: I read Ender’s Game, 13 years ago as a freshman in high school. While the movie adaptation of Ender’s Game condenses a lot of what happened in battle school, omits a lot of the politics that was happening on Earth, and glosses over the friendship between Ender and Bean, I was impressed with how the movie retained the essence of the book. Probably the most enjoyable part of the movie was seeing their interpretation of Battle School. Given how advanced technology is today, at least compared to 2001, the special effects were better than I imagined.In truth, I believe that the entire Ender’s Universe would have been better served as a mini-series or a TV show, especially if it focused on the Ender’s Shadow series as I think the general public would have related better with what was happening on EARTH than in Space. The film itself, wasn’t very accommodating for a movie franchise or even a sequel, even though it did leave things “open-ended” enough.A huge round of applause should be given to the casting. The casting of Asa Butterfield as Andrew ‘Ender’ Wiggin, the titular ‘hero,’ is perfection. He played Ender’s conflicting emotions, vulnerabilities and viciousness with a sincere conviction beyond someone his age should be able to portray. He truly is talented young man and I hope he continues acting because his future and career are bright. I was completely okay with them aging up all the characters, because let’s be honest, it’d be difficult to find a believable precocious young actor to portray a 6 year old and then to a 12/13 year old commander.My favorite scenes involved him commanding his jeesh or confronting his enemies, including even Graff. Some of the best scenes in the movie was solely just Asa’s Ender going head to head with Harrison Ford’s Colonel Graff. Speaking of, Harrison Ford is perfect as Colonel Graff, I think if the movie had been a success and a potential sequel was in the making, he’d have the necessary gruff kindness to play Bean’s confidante. And while the gender change in Anderson threw me for a second, I love Viola Davis, she’s just a fantastic actress and her Anderson is a great reminder that these soldiers in Battle school are in fact kids, who have to return to “normal” life after the war. And another brilliant nugget of casting was Nonso Anozie as Sergeant Dap. I couldn’t help shout out “Game of Thrones!” whenever he appeared on screen.I remember back in 2001, the book was always stuck in perpetual rumors of being in pre-production or casting, with names like Haley Joel Osment being thrown around as possible candidates to play Ender. 12 years later, I think the movie was made and released at the right time with the right cast, just the circumstances around the book being 28 years old and Orson Scott Card’s personal statements, mired the movie’s potential success. If it weren’t for the boycotting, the movie could have done better, and maybe the marketing could have pushed a near 30 year old book better, but it’s truly a pity most high schoolers aren’t required to read this book anymore and most kids these days don’t know much about the series.Which was why it was also such a pity that Bean wasn’t more significant in the movie adaptation. I had read that Orson Scott Card’s initial drafts to the movie adaptation of Ender’s Game were to have it centered more on Ender and Bean’s friendship. THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN THE RIGHT DIRECTION. But the director preferred pushing Ender and Petra’s friendship, which is fine, but it killed any potential opportunity for a true Shadows sequel, which in my opinion would have made better movies. Plus, Bean gets Petra in the end. Has nine children with her and he is the love of her life.Part of the problem I had with the other books in Ender’s series after Ender’s Game is that Ender’s story was interesting because not only of the war he ends, but the people IN the book he meets. The afore mentioned Bean and Petra, Alai, Dink, Shen, Graff, etc. These were all his friends and allies that don’t appear in the sequels (aside from Ender in Exile – written AFTER Bean’s Shadow sequels), so why would anyone care about them?The truth is, restoring the Formics’ world is admirable of Ender, especially how Ender’s guilt consumed him, but reading about it? Not as interesting. Learning about battle school and how Ender dealt with the pressures of the school, his actions in defending himself, and the war was interesting. But basing a franchise around his travels in space with the Formics, just isn’t appealing.I think this is why Ender’s Shadow would have made a better “franchise” starter. You start it with Ender’s Game, introducing both Ender and Bean, blending both Ender’s Game and Ender’s Shadow. Then continue on to the beginning of Ender in Exile, then Shadow of the Hegemon, Shadow Puppets, Shadow of the Giant, and then back to Ender in Exile and end it with Ender’s travels in space.What’s done is done. This is a great “companion” movie to go with the novel, Ender’s Game. As a huge fan of the Ender Shadow’s series and the book Ender’s Game, I thought everybody did the best they could with the budget and time constraints. Again, I already mentioned that it’s a pity they didn’t go with Card’s initial draft of the movie, but what’s done is done. I only hope in the future sometime, the books will be made into a miniseries as the stories and characters themselves are certainly deserving.

I enjoyed the movie, but at the same time was disappointed by some aspects of it
The theme of this movie is the moral conflict between violence and compassion. This conflict is personified early in the movie by Ender’s violent brother and compassionate sister but is most critical to the plot in Ender’s internal conflict as he tries to balance the two traits within himself. The pro-military society which developed after the human race was almost destroyed fifty years earlier by an invasion from space also plays heavily into the theme. The theme is also present in the way Colonel Graff and Major Anderson debate how Ender is treated during training. I will also add here that if you follow the physiological manipulation Colonel Graff uses to achieve his ends you might view the movie as being a physiological thriller in a science fiction setting.All of the acting in the movie was great. I was especially impressed by two of the child actors: First Asa Butterfield, his facial expressions plainly showed his feeling of isolation and fear as well as his determination and his calculating mind; Secondly I was impressed by Moises Arias, it is rare for me to feel compassion for a character who is plainly a bully but Moises Arias pulled that off. I did not feel anywhere near the level of compassion for him which Ender felt but enough to understand Ender’s reaction. Since the idea of Ender feeling compassion for the bully ties in with the overall theme it was an important characteristic.However the movie did not fully explain why they were training children in their earlier teens to be the International Fleet Commander nor did it really show why Ender was that special. At the same time I did feel early in the movie that something was missing, and I now feel that what I missed was reading the book before watching the movie. I watched this movie with almost no prior knowledge of the story. I had watched some interviews with some of the cast along with some short clips and a little “making of” footage, but not enough to really explain anything. Ben Kingsley’s brief interview and the special effects are what caught my attention.After watching the special-features and both commentaries included on the Blu-ray I now understand the theory of training the young teens as commanders. I still find it a little far fetched, but I understand that the book and the movie are targeting preteen to early teen audiences which would be far more accepting of the theory. I can set-aside by doubts in the theory and enjoy the movie on its terms once I understand its terms. The same thing goes for Ender’s special abilities, they are more fully explained in the special-features, and apparently were more fully explained in the book. I also gathered from the special-features that the main problem in fully addressing these very important plot points was time, as it is the movie is almost two hours long. I think the book should have been divided into three movies, one for the first school which was almost totally skipped by this movie, one for the battle school, and one for command school.The movie’s second strongest feature (the first being the superb acting) is its special effects, they are great, especially in battle school. This would be another reason for making a full movie of just battle school, the special effects would be spectacular. The special effects in command school were also good but way to brief, if a full movie had been devoted for command school the special effects there would probably surpass battle school.I watched the movie four times. Once with no outside knowledge of the story, then after watching the special-features I watched the movie with each of the two commentaries, and then I watched it again with the movie sound track. If you are not at all familiar with the story I would suggest watching the movie first because if you watch the special-features and commentaries first you would also gain knowledge which would detract from your enjoyment of the ending of the movie, but be sure to watch the special-features and commentaries afterwards to fill in the blanks.One final thing, this movie reminded be strongly of three prior movies. First of all, the pro-military government and the war with bugs in space reminded me of “Starship Troopers;” using video games to train, and assess military candidates reminded me of “The Last Starfighter;” and Ender’s use of “the little Doctor” reminded me something in “Star Wars,” but to tell what would be a major spoiler.

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