Ender Wiggin (Asa Butterfield) is a bright boy that the military has taken an interest in for his intuitive strategies.   They put them through a couple of tests before accepting him to Battle School where he makes friends with Petra and Bean, but he finds an enemy in child Commander Bonzo.   The military is putting kids through Battle School to find a great military mind that might make decisions that an adult might not as Earth is waiting to combat another invasion from the alien Formics who humanity defeated once before with the sacrifice of great head Mazer Rackham many years ago.   Colonel Graff (Harrison Ford) sees Ender as the answer to ending the all future conflict with the Formics.   Graff wants to isolate Ender while his fellow colleague Major Gwen Anderson (Viola Davis) wants to try a more human approach.   Time is running out as Graff changes the rules and increases the competitiveness between the child battle teams to prove Ender is the one the military needs.

 

ENDER’S GAME is one of those sci-fi classic novels.   It took several years and even screenplay attempts by Orson Scott Card before they finally settled on director Gavin Hood who ended up writing his own screenplay for it.   As a two hour movie, the movie provides an impressive adaptation that focuses more on Ender and Graff’s shaping of Ender.   They don’t push the moral issues too much even though it is very present in the film because the main thrust is Ender and Gavin Hood has made it Ender’s story.   In the end, ENDER’S GAME is one of the better sci-fi movies of the year and it makes up for Gavin Hood’s previous outing as the director of the mediocre X-MEN ORIGINS: WOLVERINE.   Hood has created what will probably be the best adaptation of the novel without making it into a three hour film or TV mini-series.   Asa Butterfield was a good choice for Ender while Harrison Ford makes you wish he was in more sci-fi films.   The special effects and production design are impressive while Steve Joblonsky creates a sci-fi score on the same level as Marco Beltrami and David Arnold.  Everything just clicks with ENDER’S GAME which makes me wish they could make a sequel to it which might be a long gamble given what movies are coming against it in the following weeks like THOR: THE DARK WORLD and THE HUNGER GAMES: CATCHING FIRE.    Go see it if you watch an alternative to the big sequel juggernauts coming to a cinema near you.

 

This movie review is (c)11-5-2013 David Blackwell and cannot be reprinted without permission. Send all comments to feedback@enterline-media.com

 

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