Almer S. Tigelaar

A Little Bit of Everything

Ender’s Game

It is 2086. Fifty years ago the earth was attacked by the Formics, an ant-like alien species. They wiped out a significant part of the Earth’s population before being stopped kamikaze-style by the legendary human pilot Mazer Rackham. Though the Formics have not returned, an attack is still feared. Hence, the people of Earth need to be battle ready: they need a new Mazer Rackham.

The unpredictable nature of the Formics makes it highly difficult to combat them. Only children’s minds are capable of adapting quickly enough to defeat them. The brightest children are selected so that they can defend against those feared future attacks. Andrew “Ender” Wiggin is one of these. He was selected based on his excellent reflexes and how he handled being bullied at school. Commander Hyrum Graff sees in him a great talent and enables him to go to battle school.

Ender shows both great tactical insight and leadership in battle school. Though, he also has problems with authority. Nevertheless, Graff’s faith endures. Perhaps, he reasons, Ender is the right candidate to lead a preemptive strike on the Formics.

Ender’s game is the film adaptation of the book with the same name written by Orson Scott Card. I have been told it is fairly faithful to the written version. Graff is well portrayed by Harrison Ford. In contrast Asa Butterfield’s role as Ender seems to be a better fit in the early stages of the movie than at the end.

Ender’s game is a decent military teen sci-fi film. It reminded me of the underrated cult-hit Starship Troopers, though Ender’s game is much less satirical. Because of the more serious tone, I would have expected more explanation about the Formic’s motivations, which are left more vague here then in the book. This would have brought more balance to the movie. Nevertheless, recommended especially for sci-fi fans.

★★★★★★★☆☆☆

IMDB | Wikipedia

Copyright © 2013 Summit Entertainment
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