It's hard to talk about Ender's Game because I honestly don't know where to start.
I wrote a little about it on my librarian blog (you can read it here if you like), mostly addressing how I felt about Orson Scott Card, the book, and going to see the movie. I always intended to see the film, no matter how I felt about OSC; when I bought my ticket, I donated to the Human Rights Campaign as well. But I've been excited about this movie since the first trailer was released; it was a really well done trailer, managing to touch on the treatment of the kids in battle school, the characterization of Ender, and the mystery of Mazer Rackham without actually saying much of anything. It looked good. The casting was good. I had no reason to be anything other than optimistic.
To say the movie didn't deliver is an understatement.
You can't be a book lover and a movie lover without running into the adaptation problem from time to time - books get adapted into movies all the time, and for the most part I enjoy them as a different mode of telling the same story. I try not to get hung up on small inaccuracies or changes made, because things inevitably have to change when moving from one medium to another. This was not the problem with Ender's Game. The problem with Ender's Game is that every change made, every omission, every alteration, fundamentally changed the tone and meaning of the story, so that by the time it's all wrapping up, you're left with a completely different message than the book offers.
From the very first scenes, which whip past you so fast it's almost impossible to digest them, I knew we were in trouble - all the key scenes were there, but presented in a manner that felt like the writers said "Okay, these moments are important, we have to include them," but without any understanding of why they were important. As a result, emotionally weighty moments from the book fall flat or feel goofy, because there's no context or buildup or anything to give them their importance. The scenes are presented almost in a vacuum, because the director has never taken the time to show you why they matter.
The "showing versus telling" is a problem here. Gavin Hood, the director, has pretty much decided that information has to be spoon-fed to the audience via voice-over or info dump by Ford, even when the telling contradicts what little he takes the time to show us. Every important development in Battle School is compressed into two battles, in ways that mean the audience has to be told why they are important - exposition which doesn't make the visual make sense, by the way. Like other big visuals (which do look stunning, I have to say), Battle School loses a lot of coherency for the sake of making a big special effects splash. You get the feeling that some things were changed simply for the sake of including those special effects.
I will say I enjoyed the acting, for the most part - Harrison Ford was perfect at getting Graff's gruffness, but also showing the real affection he develops for Ender. Ben Kingsley is great at Mazer Rackham, although his accent coasted just this side of incomprehensible. The place where the acting breaks down is with the kids, but I'm not quite willing to place all the blame on them - I've seen and loved Hailee Steinfield, Abigail Breslin and Asa Butterfield in other films. They are weak in Ender because the writing and the direction are weak, because the emotions and tone are wrong. Ford and Kingsley are great actors with years of experience under their belts, and actors of that caliber can elevate weak material (which they are absolutely doing here). Steinfeld and Butterfield simply don't have the experience; they needed more help from the script and the director, which they clearly weren't getting.
I can't really tell you how much I wanted to like this movie. I absolutely do not think the story is unfilmable - but you have to start with filmmakers that understand the material they're working with. There was a message in Hood's film, but it wasn't the message of the Ender's Game novel...and his Ender is not the Ender I grew up with.
I wrote a little about it on my librarian blog (you can read it here if you like), mostly addressing how I felt about Orson Scott Card, the book, and going to see the movie. I always intended to see the film, no matter how I felt about OSC; when I bought my ticket, I donated to the Human Rights Campaign as well. But I've been excited about this movie since the first trailer was released; it was a really well done trailer, managing to touch on the treatment of the kids in battle school, the characterization of Ender, and the mystery of Mazer Rackham without actually saying much of anything. It looked good. The casting was good. I had no reason to be anything other than optimistic.
To say the movie didn't deliver is an understatement.
Ender commands a really cool looking, but ultimately superficial, space battle
From the very first scenes, which whip past you so fast it's almost impossible to digest them, I knew we were in trouble - all the key scenes were there, but presented in a manner that felt like the writers said "Okay, these moments are important, we have to include them," but without any understanding of why they were important. As a result, emotionally weighty moments from the book fall flat or feel goofy, because there's no context or buildup or anything to give them their importance. The scenes are presented almost in a vacuum, because the director has never taken the time to show you why they matter.
The "showing versus telling" is a problem here. Gavin Hood, the director, has pretty much decided that information has to be spoon-fed to the audience via voice-over or info dump by Ford, even when the telling contradicts what little he takes the time to show us. Every important development in Battle School is compressed into two battles, in ways that mean the audience has to be told why they are important - exposition which doesn't make the visual make sense, by the way. Like other big visuals (which do look stunning, I have to say), Battle School loses a lot of coherency for the sake of making a big special effects splash. You get the feeling that some things were changed simply for the sake of including those special effects.
I will say I enjoyed the acting, for the most part - Harrison Ford was perfect at getting Graff's gruffness, but also showing the real affection he develops for Ender. Ben Kingsley is great at Mazer Rackham, although his accent coasted just this side of incomprehensible. The place where the acting breaks down is with the kids, but I'm not quite willing to place all the blame on them - I've seen and loved Hailee Steinfield, Abigail Breslin and Asa Butterfield in other films. They are weak in Ender because the writing and the direction are weak, because the emotions and tone are wrong. Ford and Kingsley are great actors with years of experience under their belts, and actors of that caliber can elevate weak material (which they are absolutely doing here). Steinfeld and Butterfield simply don't have the experience; they needed more help from the script and the director, which they clearly weren't getting.
I can't really tell you how much I wanted to like this movie. I absolutely do not think the story is unfilmable - but you have to start with filmmakers that understand the material they're working with. There was a message in Hood's film, but it wasn't the message of the Ender's Game novel...and his Ender is not the Ender I grew up with.
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