Ender's Game

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Mon Nov 04, 2013 12:03 pm

Ender's Game currently has a 7.2/10 rating on IMDB. That tells me that IMDB is full of idiots.

Here's what I liked about the film. It's about a kid ("Ender") who goes to space to fight space battles. Within 10 minutes, Ender is headed to space, so there's not an hour of back story. Right to the action, I say!

What I sort of liked about the film: a big portion of the film revolves around the space cadets learning strategy by playing a futuristic version of laser tag in a zero gravity environment. What I didn't like was that I felt like an unproportional amount of time was given to this. What I liked was, it was fun to watch. It would be like if half of Harry Potter was Quiddich footage.

What I didn't like: well, the last 20 minutes were dumb. Absolutely dumb. Also the movie was 2 hours long and felt like 3 or maybe 4.

Overall I thought it was a throwaway movie. Not terrible, not great. I also felt sorry for it for being a space movie being released this soon after Gravity. All of the weightless scenes in Ender's Game looked like people on wires as opposed to Gravity, in which they looked like weightless people.

lethargic · Post by **lethargic** » Mon Nov 04, 2013 1:02 pm

People start voting on IMDB before the movie is even out.

But I'm quite shocked that it has a 7.2 after all the controversy. I would've thought all the cry babies would've been voting 1 a million times a day.

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Mon Nov 04, 2013 6:31 pm

My guess is that particular controversy is actually helping the ratings and ticket sales here in the "buckle" ...

I was prompted to write a quick piece a while back when the whole Chick-fil-a controversy erupted. I did a Google search and quickly found two lists of businesses, one list of companies that are pro-choice and the other that are pro-life. I would bet money everybody on this forum has given money to at least one company from each list.

Back when I was too lazy to vote I would find someone with an opposing view and make a pact with them that if neither of us voted, we were cancelling each other out. It made sense at the time. So even in my head if the author of Ender's Game is staunchly anti-gay, I am pretending that Harrison Ford is pro-gay and that they will cancel each other out.

The funniest argument I saw on IMDB was, "if Hitler invented the car, would you still drive one?" I don't even know what to say to that.

AArdvark · Post by **AArdvark** » Mon Nov 04, 2013 6:37 pm

In the book there was a lot of social commentary/backstory about Ender's life while not at the Space Boy Academy. I felt that it spoke volumes about what life was like for everyone else on Earth. Is any of that mentioned in the movie?

THE
BRAVE NEW
AARDVARK

Flack · Post by **Flack** » Mon Nov 04, 2013 7:19 pm

In the first few minutes of the film Ender implies he's worthless "because I'm a third." It is implied that families are only allowed to have two children but Ender is a third. His parents to say that they wanted a third child, but it's not explained why families are limited to two children.

On Earth we see Ender get into a violent confrontation with some of his classmates. Because of this Ender believes he is getting kicked out of the program... that is, until Han Solo shows up and tells him otherwise.

We see Ender's older brother for two scenes. We see his sister for a few more. It is explained that his brother was too violent and his sister was too compassionate for the program. That's about it for back story, I think.

Ice Cream Jonsey · Post by **Ice Cream Jonsey** » Mon Nov 04, 2013 10:05 pm

Flack wrote:In the first few minutes of the film Ender implies he's worthless "because I'm a third." It is implied that families are only allowed to have two children but Ender is a third. His parents to say that they wanted a third child, but it's not explained why families are limited to two children.

Hey... have you read the book? I thought the book was great. You'd love the book and I think the book sounds better than your description of the movie.

I don't care what the author has to say about gay marriage. You get to think whatever you want in this country. He's entitled to his opinion and I hate that social justice is a stupid cult that doesn't understand context.

I also think it's great that someone that has backwards views of marriage can put together an amazing novel. I like that the world is a complex place where great art can come from all sorts of places. The social justice crowd would love it censored, but since they aren't going to leave their bedrooms, they vote it down unseen on IMDB.

Ender's first two siblings, in the book, were brilliant, so the government or whatever let his parents have a third.

lethargic · Post by **lethargic** » Wed Nov 06, 2013 1:05 pm

Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:I don't care what the author has to say about gay marriage. You get to think whatever you want in this country. He's entitled to his opinion and I hate that social justice is a stupid cult that doesn't understand context.

What I don't get, about most of these situations, is how the whiners don't understand that whining so loudly makes the thing they're whining about louder.

I had never in my life heard what Orson Scott Card thought about gay marriage. And I never would've known until the whiners pointed it out and made it a big deal. Card wasn't going around on an anti-gay crusade. I've never seen or heard the man in my life. Suddenly it's everywhere. And it's only everywhere because of the people who disagree with it. The people who are mad about his stance are the ones responsible for pushing his stance to a wider audience.

bruce · Post by **bruce** » Sun Dec 08, 2013 9:28 pm

lethargic wrote: The people who are mad about his stance are the ones responsible for pushing his stance to a wider audience.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure, based on his virulence, that Orson Scott Card has a secret "wide stance" problem, if you know what I'm sayin'.

And I think you do.

Retro · Post by **Retro** » Sun Dec 08, 2013 9:39 pm

I found myself enjoying the film regardless or Orson Scott Card's homophobia or what not: the acting was a bit hackneyed, story elements were cut left and right, characters were a little shallow, but the journey was fun and it was neat to see video game type space battles in a film.

So.... Yes.... Not a terrible experience and about what I'd expect from a book adaptation.

pinback · Post by **pinback** » Mon Dec 09, 2013 11:56 pm

I read most of Ender's Game at a Redskins game, before the game started, and then again at halftime. I thought it was great. It made me an Orson Scott Card fan.

I went to a book signing for Xenocide, the third Ender book. He was enormous, but he signed my book.

After that every book he wrote was about Space Mormons (or in the past, Fantasy Mormons.)

Jonsey makes points I can get behind. So a guy hates fags, but writes a great book. One doesn't lessen the other. Or does it?

I guess my point is, I have no particular opinion about any of this one way or the other.

AArdvark · Post by **AArdvark** » Sun Sep 07, 2014 11:26 am

Just saw the movie. It made me think of how some movies distill the book story to bring out the essence. (Amityville Horror and Jaws come to mind)

Some movies keep every little detail and nuance to try and faithfully reproduce the book on film (LOTR and possibly every other Peter Jackson movie as well)

Some movies just keep the name and the 'good parts' but make a totally different movie altogether (Forrest Gump and every 007 James Bond film)

Ender's Game falls into the first category. I never read the rest of the Ender's books so the last part made no sense to me. There's a bunch more stuff that could, and should have included but it would have taken away from the 'action movie' label.

The only other thing I will add here (cause the Carpal Tunnel's killing me today) is that that's Harrison Ford's worst haircut since Regarding Henry

Tdarcos · Post by **Tdarcos** » Thu Sep 11, 2014 7:57 pm

Flack wrote:My guess is that particular controversy is actually helping the ratings and ticket sales here in the "buckle" ...

I was prompted to write a quick piece a while back when the whole Chick-fil-a controversy erupted.

I heard about some church hat only wanted really moral people, so they refused to admit sinners...

Flack wrote:The funniest argument I saw on IMDB was, "if Hitler invented the car, would you still drive one?" I don't even know what to say to that.

A lot of people do. Where do you think Volkswagen came from? Hitler wanted the development of a "people's car" so that's where the original design (and name) came from.