Ender's Game

pretty much what he ^^^ said.

As a big fan of the book (re read recent with my 10 year old son) I still enjoyed it. It was mostly a different story, they did some clever compressing of ideas that I thought worked well.

On the neg side: They made Ender too much of a "team player" he should have been much more "remote" from the other kids. I did not like the compressing of all the battle school inovations into one battle. They should have led up to the final school battle as the climax of act II. Then rebuilt to the climax of the DR Device and the final big reveal. In the book each innovation was a new battle, the battles escalated in unfairness and more tolling on Ender as a leader, in the movie he barley seemed put out by the extra work. I felt the big reveal was too "telegraphed" though in fairness I knew the endings, so maybe thats just me.

I'm curious if there are any viewers who didnt see the big reveal coming a mile away?
 
These were basically the only books I read growing up in my teen years. I think the series helped define who I am as a person today.

Finally seeing the movie after all these years was one of the most emotional experiences I've ever had. I cried the whole way through.

As an objective filmmaker though, I'd say the dialogue felt very rushed. It was like there were a bunch of sound bites that needed to be hit, and the characters said them, but left out the normal conversation in between. I'd like it to have been a half hour longer so it could take it's time, but I suspect a normal audience would have become bored.

If speaker for the dead gets made I think it could be a masterpiece, because it's not about the action. I could see it winning some serious awards.
 
I agree with you there moonshieldmedia. These are impactfull stories, if you haven't read the sequels as an adult you should do so, they are much more meaningful with a bit of life experience and the intellectual content can yield new wonders to your updated brain!


I don't see the sequels as being good movie material, there is a lot of internal mindscape stuff that is too sublime to be converted to visuals in anyway that would keep true to the vision. Enders Game was also very internal, and a large portion of that was lost in the movie, though i think they could have done a bit more to externalize the internal
 
I just saw the movie in a discount theatre, and the beginning was boring. The middle wasn't too great either, because it came across as a bunch of kids playing out on a zero-G holodeck.

Yes, the kid crying about committing genocide was really corny. And the idea that the insect queen put a dream in his head, telling him to go to the crashed spaceship, well, I wouldn't go, especially if I just exterminated her species, because that could be a trap - spiders do lure their prey after all.

The problem is that the book is far too long to be made into a good movie. Perhaps if it was made into two movies, it might have fared better. All in all, it made for a fun afternoon, but no more. And, yes, I didn't really care for the characters.
 
I saw this movie a few weeks ago and was utterly disappointed. I've never read the books, but heard good things about them, and also heard good things about the movie itself (I read a review that said it was better than Gravity, and gave it a 10/10).

IMO, it was decidedly average. It looked like the sort of film that will probably sell a lot of video games and a few figurines - maybe even spawn a sim ride at a theme park.
But nothing amazing, nothing incredible.

The dialogue was average and unrealistic, the plot was weird and the whole thing was just a bit too unbelievable.

I also found the cinematography incredibly hit and miss, not something I'd have expected from Donald McAlpine, but some of the night shots especially were IMO unacceptably noisy, and the look of the whole thing felt like it would have benefitted from the majesty of film, rather than the clean, clerical look and feel of RED.

It was, however, the first film I've seen that happened to be in a Dolby Atmos theatre, and I have to tell you there's no beating it. I'm disappointed with any other sound experience now. I thought the sound design and mix were awesome.
 
Atmos is definitely the next step in the theatrical film experience now that huge screens and surround sound has made it into homes.
I'm also curious about the "side screens" in theaters I've been hearing about.
 
I read the book, so I knew what was coming, but I think the book should have been adapted in two or three movies.

For what it's worth, I say Hunger Games last night, and it was a better movie, though I've never read the book.
 
My biggest issue was that there was nothing keeping me there. I was shown a series of events that was supposed to have occurred, and I didn't care for much of it. I kept waiting for the big thing to happen and it simply didn't. As far as I'm concerned
having the 'graduation' battle as it was (i.e. - the real battle) was simply anti climactic. I was expecting so much more.

Major plot points seemed to be simply brushed over like
why they needed to use kids in the first place, rather than the guy who was supposed to be dead but is actually alive, and apparently knows better than the kid anyway ('he's not ready'), or why Ford's computer appeared with an 'imminent threat' when the threat apparently wasn't imminent (they committed genocide apparently - so was the computer wrong?), and what purpose Viola Davis' character served apart from to provide exposition, in case anyone wasn't quite understanding Ender's mindset.

I also think it was potentially Harrison Ford's weakest performance, probably on-par with Jodie Foster's mediocre performance in Elysium.

Just overall an average movie - maybe I'd like it better if I'd read the books but IMO it can only ever be an average movie if you don't really get it unless you've read the books.

But, awesome sound ;)
 
I've mentioned this before, but the characters make the movie. This movie didn't have characters that I cared about, though the book did.
Furthermore, you would care about the insect if you read the book, but not this one.

Anyway, I've mentioned ethnicity in the characters. This movie had a bit of it, though it didn't have Han Tzu, aka "Hot Soup", who was a kid in the book, and I was waiting for him to show up, except he didn't.

I'm wondering if Orson Scott Card's anti-gay stance had anything to do with the poor box-office showing.
 
It's interesting to hear people who haven't read the book talk about how boring the ending was. When I read the book for the first time my mind was completely blown. Such a great experience. Sad that it doesn't come through on screen.
 
moonshieldmedia said:
It's interesting to hear people who haven't read the book talk about how boring the ending was. When I read the book for the first time my mind was completely blown. Such a great experience. Sad that it doesn't come through on screen.
Click to expand...

It was a great book.

This movie was in development hell for over a decade, by the way, so that may have affected the quality.
 
Aspiring Mogul said:
I'm wondering if Orson Scott Card's anti-gay stance had anything to do with the poor box-office showing.
Click to expand...

It would be interesting if there were an (at least vaguely) scientific investigation into that question, with conclusions.

Like the I.T. rule says, politics only serve to divide us. You can't blame Card for being a political animal (like most of us are) and wanting to express his beliefs and convictions, writer and producer, or not. He has every right to do so. But, the minority he openly maligned also has a right to not support his projects financially.

That's just a possible consequence of opening your mouth and saying you don't like so-and-so. So-and-so is liable to choose not to support you. It comes with the territory.

Personally, I'm rather glad that I didn't support the film by paying to see it. Though I probably will see it sooner or later. And I'm slightly interested in reading the book, given all the love I.T.ers are expressing for it.

Anyway. That said. The minority he wished to deny disputed rights to, the same minority he apparently wanted to remain or to be re-criminalized, is only a small percentage of the population, right? And how many of that minority would have gone to the theater to see his film, anyway, and even, say, if Card had expressed only love and support for them over the years?

Even if you consider the friends of gay people also avoiding his film, could even that have really hurt turnout much? And again, how many of those people would have skipped it anyway?

In other words... Looks like it did do pretty poorly at the box office. But did the gay "boycott" have any significant effect? Or was it really just because there wasn't enough interest in what sounds like a mediocre film generally, having nothing or little to do with Card's politics?

Anyway. The book sounds much more interesting than the film does.
 
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