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Title: Ender's Game Post by: Shannow on May 03, 2013, 12:23:38 PM Trailer for the trailer is out. Link. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OHtH_RWnZE)
Real trailer to come out May 7th. I'm probably going to hate this movie. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on May 03, 2013, 12:55:05 PM Well, that brief two seconds was true to the books.
:uhrr: Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ratman_tf on May 03, 2013, 02:03:24 PM I am cautiously optimistic.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: disKret on May 03, 2013, 02:08:13 PM Rackham with tatoo? Was it lost in translation for me?
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on May 03, 2013, 02:40:59 PM Um, it never really went into detail. As a character, he mattered about as much as my farts, not less what he looked like.
They could make him a 280 pound lesbian and it wouldn't matter. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: WayAbvPar on May 03, 2013, 02:43:43 PM Rackham with tatoo? Was it lost in translation for me? I wish they would, just to watch SOC's head come apart. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Shannow on May 03, 2013, 03:29:34 PM Rackham with tatoo? Was it lost in translation for me? I wish they would, just to watch SOC's head come apart. A Married lesbian to really rub it in. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Shannow on May 07, 2013, 01:32:31 PM Saw the trailer, too lazy to link.
Will definitely hate this, looks like shit. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on May 07, 2013, 01:48:37 PM A for Effort young man.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Samwise on May 07, 2013, 01:51:20 PM Here's the trailer (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vP0cUBi4hwE).
I agree, looks a bit off. Like the Hobbit movie, I will go watch it, fully expecting that I will hate 90% of it, and I will try to enjoy the other 10%. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: RhyssaFireheart on May 07, 2013, 02:23:51 PM I got the feeling that Ender (and the rest of the kids) knew this was an actual war with aliens rather than it being presented as war games or an elaborate simulation. That was the thing - finding out that what he and the others had been doing really wasn't a simulation or war games but they'd actually been fighting and killing the aliens all along was a huge mind-fuck for Ender and gave him some serious issues to deal with. I really did not get that feeling from that trailer at all.
It looks pretty but.. I dunno. And Harrison Ford just didn't do it for me as the narrator there. Something about his voice just felt off. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: schild on May 07, 2013, 02:27:18 PM I like entertaining movies. I like Ben Kingsley and weird-old-phone-everything-in Harrison Ford.
I am not arrogant enough to give a shit about things remaining true to the books. The fact I'm saying this makes all of you fucking weird. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on May 07, 2013, 02:27:46 PM Well, much like Rhyssa, that trailer gave the game away.
:why_so_serious: Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: schild on May 07, 2013, 02:29:52 PM Claiming you didn't get the same feeling from a 90 second trailer that is supposed to get random mouthbreathers excited as you did from a near-masterpiece level of literature (I consider any piece of Sci-fi I can tolerate a near-masterpiece, I despise sci-fi) - is just a little goofy.
People who read and praise the book are not the target audience for a movie with that sort of star power. Edit: Also, the trailer didn't give shit away. For people that didn't read the book, it said absolutely nothing. They know NOTHING about what the book is about other than "kids in the military." Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Triax on May 07, 2013, 03:52:26 PM OSC has already stated that they're giving away the surprise ending to the audience in the beginning in earlier interviews regarding the script. The character of Ender isn't aware, but the audience will be. I understand the reasons why they did that and thought it necessary with the age of the novel and the number of people who already know. Now, it's possible the script has undergone severe revision since the interview, but with the control-freak aspects and control OSC has maintained on his properties, I doubt it. And there have been no indications that OSC's script has been altered dramatically since.
Quote The second decision I made was to give that information about the surprise at the end from the start. In my script we know who Mazer Rackham really is and we know what is at stake as Ender plays his games Source: http://hatrack.com/research/interviews/1998-scott-nicholson.shtml (http://hatrack.com/research/interviews/1998-scott-nicholson.shtml) Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Evildrider on May 07, 2013, 03:58:34 PM Umm.. is that interview from 1998? lol.
OSC doesn't get a script writing credit on IMDB. It's given to Gavin Hood. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Bokonon on May 07, 2013, 06:03:38 PM Plus the "this isn't a game" twist, isn't even the real twist in the ending.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Venkman on May 07, 2013, 07:07:50 PM I got the feeling that Ender (and the rest of the kids) knew this was an actual war with aliens rather than it being presented as war games or an elaborate simulation. That was the thing - finding out that what he and the others had been doing really wasn't a simulation or war games but they'd actually been fighting and killing the aliens all along was a huge mind-fuck for Ender and gave him some serious issues to deal with. I really did not get that feeling from that trailer at all. It looks pretty but.. I dunno. And Harrison Ford just didn't do it for me as the narrator there. Something about his voice just felt off. Right with you on all points. Edit: Also, the trailer didn't give shit away. For people that didn't read the book, it said absolutely nothing. They know NOTHING about what the book is about other than "kids in the military." There's no reason to make a movie based on a book (or comic book) if you don't expect to also inherit that fanbase. Otherwise, what's the point of the royalty and creative ownership headaches? Just go make a Minority Report or Fifth Element. So there's no reason for this movie to exist except that it was a wildly popular book for then-kids/now-adults who still play videogames. People who don't know the book are going to see a boring generic antiseptic sci-fi setting establishing yet another child actor's career in rather bland hero's journey. The cynical will think "sci fi Harry Potter". And this launching in the same year as quite a few sci-fi/fantasy movies with much broader awareness, bigger budgets, and in many cases, already establish movie fans. Oh and it's scheduled to launch a week before Thor. By the time the summer closes, I wouldn't be surprised if this gets pushed into the far less competitive March timeframe. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Abagadro on May 07, 2013, 09:05:59 PM Won't see it just because it would result in OSC getting approximately 2 cents of my money. Fuck that lunatic.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Selby on May 07, 2013, 09:30:15 PM Won't see it just because it would result in OSC getting approximately 2 cents of my money. Fuck that lunatic. /agreed. I am definitely not a fan of his and as a result won't read anything he has done or give him any money.Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: MahrinSkel on May 07, 2013, 09:36:42 PM Won't see it just because it would result in OSC getting approximately 2 cents of my money. Fuck that lunatic. Ditto. I'm used to finding out that Sci-Fi writers I enjoy have politics I disagree with, beyomd the long shadow of RAH, 'conservative' was the contrarian position if you grew up in the 40's through 70's, which most of the ones I grew up reading did.But OSC's politics aren't the issue as much as his holier than thou moralizing. And that's embedded so deep into his stuff, even the earlier work like Ender's Game is contaminated retroactively. --Dave Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on May 08, 2013, 12:52:57 AM Won't see it just because it would result in OSC getting approximately 2 cents of my money. Fuck that lunatic. That goes without saying. Though we have said that in other threads on the topic. Way too much serious in here. Like most, I was a huge Ender fan when it first came out. Now ? Not so much... Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Numtini on May 08, 2013, 06:34:32 AM I'd like to see the movie, but we're a bit short on money right now since our tax bill was $1100 more than it would have been without Mr. Card's pet hate group. So I guess I won't be going.
I might be outside walking in a circle with a sign though. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: HaemishM on May 08, 2013, 12:41:36 PM Won't see it just because it would result in OSC getting approximately 2 cents of my money. Fuck that lunatic. This. Also, hated every fucking character in that book. EVERY ONE. Thought the book was really kind of shitty because of it, and them giving away the "this is not a game" twist at the beginning of the movie is really going to drain all the impact out of the ending. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Khaldun on May 08, 2013, 12:53:19 PM I re-read the book not long ago and was surprised at how not-good it was. A lot of its impact on me on the first run was a fans-are-slans thing (e.g., taking Ender as a sort of Mary Sue stand-in for all of the geek suffering I'd had plus the feelings that every geek has about being better than all the bullies). The Battle School stuff is still pretty interesting but it kind of reads a bit like an updated version of the Dorsai novel Tactics of Mistake--an icy military commander who can do no wrong, always out-thinks enemies, etc. The central problem is that it is describing cognitive supersoldiers without anything making them that way other than some kind of hand-waving eugenics and once you recognize that it gets pretty creepy: that Ender isn't any kind of enhanced human.
What really reads poorly now is the stuff with Peter and Valentine. It wasn't even believable then but it just seems stupid now, not just about the technology but about everything. It was an early warning of how impoverished Card's ability to imagine society and politics really is, and should have been seen as an early alert system of his fuck-up-edness. I hope they have the good sense to just completely jettison all that shit. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: ghost on May 08, 2013, 12:53:32 PM I bet that the movie is better than the book.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Venkman on May 08, 2013, 04:56:42 PM The book that we think we remember or the book that we'd reread now? :grin:
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Chimpy on May 08, 2013, 05:02:59 PM I didn't read Ender's Game until maybe a year ago. I thought it was kinda cool but nothing stellar to me.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Trippy on May 08, 2013, 05:08:13 PM Speaker for the Dead is better, though quite a bit different in style.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Margalis on May 08, 2013, 05:40:58 PM This. Also, hated every fucking character in that book. EVERY ONE. Thought the book was really kind of shitty because of it Yep, didn't like the book at all. Got strong super douche vibes from it, far before I knew that OSC was a super douche. I don't remember much about it but from what I recall yes, the character of Ender was sort of a blatant Mary Sue nerd revenge fantasy, and I also recall the book being fairly unkind to the female characters. Mostly though I was just bored. Make a movie out of the Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch please. (Actually don't do that!) Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Samwise on May 08, 2013, 05:48:11 PM I really liked Ender's Game when I read it as a kid, but then I was the target demographic of persecuted nerd, so it naturally hit the right buttons for me. It does feel a little bit more clunky going back to it as an adult.
Speaker for the Dead holds up really well, though. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Khaldun on May 08, 2013, 06:27:48 PM Yeah. I read Speaker again after doing Ender's. It's surprisingly good and it makes me wonder about Card: how can you imagine something even for a moment that requires that much empathy and then be such a thoroughly unempathetic person? It does give you some hope about how people can overcome their own limitations.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: HaemishM on May 08, 2013, 07:04:04 PM I made it through Ender's Game. I did not make it through Speaker. As vile and hateable as every character in Ender's was, Speaker made me want to hatefuck every single character to death. Finding out later that Card is a rabid homophobic bigot of the highest order just made me less inclined to try to slog through that shit.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ratman_tf on May 09, 2013, 01:15:37 AM There's no reason to make a movie based on a book (or comic book) if you don't expect to also inherit that fanbase. Otherwise, what's the point of the royalty and creative ownership headaches? Just go make a Minority Report or Fifth Element. Name brand recognition. I guarantee Hasbro has pitched around ideas for Candyland The Movie. By Michael Bay. Personally, I'm waiting for Chia Pets The Movie. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Margalis on May 09, 2013, 01:24:51 AM Name brand recognition. I guarantee Hasbro has pitched around ideas for a second Candyland The Movie, this one with Adam Sandler Fixed! Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Phred on May 12, 2013, 12:52:28 AM I got the feeling that Ender (and the rest of the kids) knew this was an actual war with aliens rather than it being presented as war games or an elaborate simulation. That was the thing - finding out that what he and the others had been doing really wasn't a simulation or war games but they'd actually been fighting and killing the aliens all along was a huge mind-fuck for Ender and gave him some serious issues to deal with. I'm confused. Did he know it all along and keep his thought's hidden through the entire book or was it a huge mind fuck when he found out. Damn, the contradiction of this is killing me.Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: SurfD on May 12, 2013, 01:17:39 AM In the book, it is pretty clear that it was a huge mindfuck for him when he finds out. All that time, he believed he was being trained to assume command when the fighting started. He never realized that the fighting had already started and his training exercises (after about mid way through) in the "simulator" were actually live combat engagements that he was directing.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on May 12, 2013, 01:32:25 AM The minute he went to Command School, he was in Command.
He didn't know that. But apparently, in rewrites, Bean did. Because of Retardery. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Simond on May 12, 2013, 03:27:24 AM Reminder: Ender is future-Hitler. (http://peachfront.diaryland.com/enderhitlte.html)
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on May 12, 2013, 03:40:33 AM :oh_i_see:
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Shannow on October 30, 2013, 11:43:56 AM Interesting article on the development of this film (http://www.grantland.com/blog/hollywood-prospectus/post/_/id/91066/endgame-the-unfilmable-enders-games-28-years-in-development-hell)
Still think it will be shit. ps Obligatory note that Card is an arsehole. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on October 30, 2013, 11:55:04 AM My parents loved it.
Make of that what you will. I'm still not spending money on it, no matter how much I wanted to see this movie made. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: HaemishM on October 30, 2013, 12:48:23 PM I'm still not spending money on it This. Fuck Card in his tiny Mormon asshole. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Samwise on October 30, 2013, 01:16:45 PM I'm going to try to organize a mass theater-hop with some friends. Need to figure out which other movie to buy the tickets for.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on October 30, 2013, 01:41:33 PM I'm going to try to organize a mass theater-hop with some friends. Need to figure out which other movie to buy the tickets for. What's that ? A Walkout ? Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: MahrinSkel on October 30, 2013, 01:44:34 PM I'm going to try to organize a mass theater-hop with some friends. Need to figure out which other movie to buy the tickets for. What's that ? A Walkout ? --Dave Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Samwise on October 30, 2013, 01:48:15 PM I'm thinking Bad Grandpa is much more deserving of my box office receipts.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on October 30, 2013, 01:50:01 PM I'm going to try to organize a mass theater-hop with some friends. Need to figure out which other movie to buy the tickets for. What's that ? A Walkout ? --Dave Hmmmm. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Evildrider on October 30, 2013, 01:53:42 PM See theater hopping to me is when you pay for a movie, watch it, then sneak into other movies when yours is over.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Samwise on October 30, 2013, 01:58:33 PM Same exact effect.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Rendakor on October 30, 2013, 02:16:39 PM Except that's closer to illegal, because you paid for one movie but saw two.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Merusk on October 30, 2013, 03:24:48 PM I'm thinking Bad Grandpa is much more deserving of my box office receipts. Bad Grandpa if you want to Encourage more Jackass spin-offs. The Turkey movie that comes out Friday if you want to encourage more bad CGI. I'd give to Cloudy with a Chance2 if you didn't see it. Or how about Machete Kills. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Signe on October 30, 2013, 05:48:03 PM Orson Scott Card and theatre popcorn contains as much fecal matter as shit. I'd rather throw my $ in the toilet.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: kaid on October 31, 2013, 08:47:24 AM Reminder: Ender is future-Hitler. (http://peachfront.diaryland.com/enderhitlte.html) The really ironic thing about the whole forgiving hitler sillyness is pretty much at the end of the bugger war ender was seen as a hero. He himself eventually changed peoples perception of himself until people came to revile him as the xenocide. It was him and him alone that convinced people that he did was wrong. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on October 31, 2013, 09:34:14 AM There is an argument to be made that he merely saw the truth before everyone else did...
I don't agree that he did anything with his own image. It was more how he humanised the invaders. Also, Ender isn't future Hitler. I find all the wanking in the later books and from Critical Theorists to be so much toilet paper. It's much, much better to keep that shit out of Enders Game. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Khaldun on October 31, 2013, 11:17:40 AM I think of Ender's Game as one part "Fans are Slans", a bit like Gordon Dickson's early Dorsai books--basically a kind of reflexive bit of Mary Sueism that complimented and soothed most of its early readers. Most of us liked it because we saw ourselves in Ender (or maybe Peter and Valentine): bullied precocious geniuses surrounded by hostile structures who would win out in the end. The fact that 'winning out' at the end of the book means what it does was not something that a lot of us paid attention to--the parts of the book that were a draw were Ender in the Battle School.
The Battle School stuff still holds up in that sort of 'triumph of the bullied' sense and you can still sort of buy Ender as being so much a genius that he does what he does. The stuff with Peter and Valentine doesn't hold up at all (and was kind of laughable then, even.) The forward motion of the story at the very end is still effective (and Speaker for the Dead is maybe the book which demonstrates to me that Card used to have an ethical sensitivity that he's long since completely lost). Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on October 31, 2013, 11:29:00 AM Red Prophet I reread recently and it was like it wasn't the same bloke. Love and peace and understanding and nuance all you could think was 'Wow, 9/11 broke this motherfucker hard.'
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Margalis on October 31, 2013, 04:17:25 PM Ender's Game is the story of a guy who's way better than everyone else and is "reluctantly" forced to constantly show that off. It's hard to read it and not think about what kind of psyche it took to write it and how many times a day "I'll show them!!!" crossed their mind. No surprise at all that the author turned out to be a small-minded mean-spirited ass. It really rubbed me the wrong way at the time I read it, well before I knew anything about Card.
The high level "guy does training stuff that turns out to have been real the entire time" twist was a good idea, but the "people who fantasize about how they are way better than everyone else will love this book" angle is a huge turn-off. I suppose it's not too dissimilar from the typical "pig farmer turns out to be hero of legend" plot but it's presented in a very mean-spirited way, and is treated less as a sort of divine gift or fortunate revelation and more as plain genetic superiority. In most legendary hero stories the guy who finds out he is the chosen one still has to work hard to live up to that legacy, whereas Ender is just inherently awesome all the time without effort. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: SurfD on November 01, 2013, 12:04:06 AM Ender's Game is the story of a guy who's way better than everyone else and is "reluctantly" forced to constantly show that off. It's hard to read it and not think about what kind of psyche it took to write it and how many times a day "I'll show them!!!" crossed their mind. No surprise at all that the author turned out to be a small-minded mean-spirited ass. It really rubbed me the wrong way at the time I read it, well before I knew anything about Card. Well, yeah. I mean, wasn't it pretty much established right from about chapter 2 of the book that Ender quite literally was "born" to do what he was supposed to do?The high level "guy does training stuff that turns out to have been real the entire time" twist was a good idea, but the "people who fantasize about how they are way better than everyone else will love this book" angle is a huge turn-off. I suppose it's not too dissimilar from the typical "pig farmer turns out to be hero of legend" plot but it's presented in a very mean-spirited way, and is treated less as a sort of divine gift or fortunate revelation and more as plain genetic superiority. In most legendary hero stories the guy who finds out he is the chosen one still has to work hard to live up to that legacy, whereas Ender is just inherently awesome all the time without effort. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: pxib on November 01, 2013, 01:06:51 AM A long, ultimately bitter article by an ex-child prodigy about rereading Ender's Game as an adult... and a writer. (http://adamcadre.ac/calendar/13/13857.html)
Very opinionated. Covers a lot of ground. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Margalis on November 01, 2013, 02:19:04 AM Well, yeah. I mean, wasn't it pretty much established right from about chapter 2 of the book that Ender quite literally was "born" to do what he was supposed to do? There are a lot of stories that use that template that don't give me the same vibe though. I mean, half of fantasy and anime use it. But typically the chosen one has to still go on a tough journey, train hard, meet reliable companions, overcome adversity, etc. They have the power but they have to unlock it and use it correctly. Whereas Ender is just always awesome. I mean, look at Star Wars. Luke is the chosen one but at the start of the first film he's kind of a naive dumbass who sucks at a lot of things. Quote from: pxib A long, ultimately bitter article by an ex-child prodigy about rereading Ender's Game as an adult... and a writer. The part about speaking subtext is a great observation. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on November 01, 2013, 02:54:22 AM Yeah, what really troubled me about the whole thing was that Ender was meant to be this genius and he hadn't even figured out the twist in the novel half way through like I had.
:why_so_serious: Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on November 01, 2013, 03:12:05 AM A long, ultimately bitter article by an ex-child prodigy about rereading Ender's Game as an adult... and a writer. (http://adamcadre.ac/calendar/13/13857.html) Very opinionated. Covers a lot of ground. What he said about Lost Boys is bang on. That fucking book is MENTAL. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: HaemishM on November 01, 2013, 10:37:57 AM You all seem to be forgetting that Ender is just one of an entire cast of characters who are all utterly unlikeable, unsympathetic and annoying as hell, and glossing over the very painfully awkward incestuous vibe given off by Ender and his sister. I'm glad I didn't read the book until adulthood because I might have liked it otherwise. :why_so_serious:
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Venkman on November 01, 2013, 11:18:12 AM Yeah, what really troubled me about the whole thing was that Ender was meant to be this genius and he hadn't even figured out the twist in the novel half way through like I had. I first read it around when it came out, I was 15 and just a year into creating Zork knockoffs on my Apple //e, about a year before even getting a color monitor, and a few years before ST: The Next Generation introduce Holodecks into the zeitgeist, and Black September introduced the internet ("public forums") to the masses. I lacked the kind of context to make your leap :-) Nowadays though it's passe. The whole book is. I don't care about Card the person, but the whole plot has been done to death now: Child prodigy gets special treatment and training to take down the bad guys. Maybe audiences will go for that twist. But shit, they had that as far back as Toys (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0105629/). I will say that at least it looks like this isn't a I, Robot/World War Z style brand labelslap over some other script. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on November 01, 2013, 11:18:23 AM Also, Peter regularly 'abuses' her.
Valentine is an awful character, awfully written. Again, I didn't get that until I was older. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: SurfD on November 01, 2013, 02:16:58 PM Well, yeah. I mean, wasn't it pretty much established right from about chapter 2 of the book that Ender quite literally was "born" to do what he was supposed to do? There are a lot of stories that use that template that don't give me the same vibe though. I mean, half of fantasy and anime use it. But typically the chosen one has to still go on a tough journey, train hard, meet reliable companions, overcome adversity, etc. They have the power but they have to unlock it and use it correctly. Whereas Ender is just always awesome. I mean, look at Star Wars. Luke is the chosen one but at the start of the first film he's kind of a naive dumbass who sucks at a lot of things. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: tazelbain on November 01, 2013, 02:20:29 PM I am really starting to hate chosen ones.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Margalis on November 01, 2013, 04:33:13 PM I read it in college. I was a voracious Sci-Fi reader up to that point, which is maybe why I was immune to its appeal. It just did nothing for me at all.
Maybe had I been younger or had not read as much other SF it would have been different. I don't know if it's considered YA but it definitely feels like the kind of thing that would appeal more to people less familiar with the genre. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ingmar on November 01, 2013, 04:41:02 PM I think literally every person I know who liked it read it somewhere in the 10-14 age range or so, and most of them were suffering bullying issues or whatever. It's not hard to see why the other stuff would pass someone by if they get that strongly attached to that part of the theme, it's when they reread it as adults and don't give it a side-eye afterwards that I don't get.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Setanta on November 01, 2013, 05:50:44 PM I liked the book minus the Peter/Valentine bits. I don't know that I'll see the movie.
What really worries me is that I read that Old Man's War is going to be turned into a movie. I can see them fucking that up royally (I'd be happy to be wrong). Ender's Game was going to be an average the second that the "secret" was leaked - in this case, the trailer. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Trippy on November 01, 2013, 06:46:32 PM I am really starting to hate chosen ones. I liked Ender's Game when it first came out but after reading the beginning of Seventh Son I realized what was going on with the whole Mormon chosen child schtick that was his thing back then (dunno if he's still writing that same sort of stuff now).Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: naum on November 02, 2013, 07:40:28 AM From a FB friend (who is female and a school teacher):
Quote Ender's Game was one of the worst movies I've ever seen. Horrible writing and horrible acting. If you love the book, don't see it. If you have never read the book, don't see it. If you breathe oxygen, don't see it. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Trippy on November 02, 2013, 08:22:31 AM The Rotten Tomatoes score (http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/enders-game/) is currently at 64%.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ghambit on November 02, 2013, 03:26:56 PM This movie has been out over 2 days and none of you bastards is reporting back. Wtf good are you? I can't wait any longer... seein it tonite.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Mrbloodworth on November 02, 2013, 03:28:37 PM This movie has been out over 2 days and none of you bastards is reporting back. Wtf good are you? I can't wait any longer... seein it tonite. I was about to ask if the movie was any good? Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Khaldun on November 02, 2013, 04:41:17 PM I've already decided that this is a Netflix film for me at best.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Teleku on November 02, 2013, 06:12:40 PM Yeah, having seen middle'ish reviews on Rotten Tomatoes, and not much here (except for the par for the course beret discussions of the book :awesome_for_real:), I'll probably go see Gra Endera tomorrow at my local Kinoteka.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Venkman on November 02, 2013, 06:19:48 PM Is it really worth jumping on the premiere weekend of a movie with a lot of skepticism just so we can fight through the teenagers with nowhere else to go and risk a bad movie besides?
What really worries me is that I read that Old Man's War is going to be turned into a movie. I can see them fucking that up royally (I'd be happy to be wrong). Hmm. Assuming they cram the series into a flick rather than just the first book, that could be an interesting business proposition. Last Vegas, the Reds, Old Mans War plays into these kind of Baby Boomer "second/third act" empowerment flicks. But unlike those two, a properly done OMW (heh) could have a pretty wide appeal. I'm sure they'll play down the politics, maybe tone down the green skin/science a bit (since though it's cool, even BrainPal is something we assume we'll have in our lifetimes). But all that's just based on the idea somebody might make a movie someday. In parallel, yes I can see them fucking it up all sorts of bad, doing shit like just drugging up people that keeps them old but allows them to cast like Clint Eastwood or some shit. Actually, that maybe wouldn't be too terrible. Imagine a geriatric Expendables :awesome_for_real: Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Thrawn on November 02, 2013, 06:34:57 PM It was better than I expected, but just ok, it packs so much in trying to fit everything big from the book that most of the scenes don't feel well enough explained or deep enough. Stuff that in the book was a big deal doesn't seem as important in the movie because you don't have the attachment to it or know the thoughts of the characters. A friend I saw it with who hadn't read the book said the movie was ok, but that he enjoyed it much more after I explain some of the scenes and missing explanations to him.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: MahrinSkel on November 02, 2013, 07:52:42 PM Actually, that maybe wouldn't be too terrible. Imagine a geriatric Expendables :awesome_for_real: You mean, Expendables 2? :rimshot: --Dave Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Hammond on November 04, 2013, 07:44:21 AM It was just ok and some of the parts felt fairly rushed / cut short. We tried to get into Bad Grampa but it was sold so this was our fall back. My buddy that went with me never read the books and he thought it was ok. I had hoped for some better special effects but for a sci-fi movie it really didn't deliver except the last space battle.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ghambit on November 07, 2013, 02:41:34 PM I liked the film and thought it was worthy a night out to the theatre. Doubly-so if you've got a kid at home (for the life lessons). The only notable acting job was Ender. I thought everyone else was fairly mediocre, even Ford. The shrink-lady was good too though.
Was it the best sci-fi? heck no. But definitely better then a mere netflix night. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: SurfD on November 07, 2013, 11:55:14 PM I enjoyed it. As expected, they completely axed the Valentine + Peter political sideplot, which would have really contributed nothing to the movie being that it was all about Ender. Stayed really faithful to the book. Hit pretty much every major point regarding Enders progression through battle school to command school and ended well. About the only thing I could really complain about was that while you do get some sense of Ender's development into a commander, it all came across as very rushed to fit it into the time frame of the movie. If they ever did a director's cut, I think the movie could use a good 10 or 15 more minutes of "Battle School" training montage type scenes, where you get to see Ender's progress both before and after Dragon army is formed and the way his approach to things causes a big shift in the way things are done by the armies.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: MediumHigh on November 08, 2013, 11:36:56 PM I liked this movie. In much the same way the nerd I am is just simply happy to see a movie like this made. It's a safe, safe, safe, adaptation of a book which could have been an hour longer if translated to film (and still not show the peter + valentine rise to power...by blogging). Instead this is the family friendly abridged version and it's not a bad thing, though kinda edging on the lazy side. Those who came to see a 10-12 year old leave behind broken bodies in his wake, deal with the oppression of loneliness, get picked on, tortured physically and emotionally and ultimately rise above that....err no. But if you want to see Ender be awesome, get yelled at for no reason, and well have his tender "never really wanted to hurt anybody" moments, than this is your movie. Oh and they make him hella creepy in this one.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ghambit on November 09, 2013, 12:23:44 PM After seeing Thor, I thought this was better.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Abagadro on November 10, 2013, 09:20:49 AM Heh. 62 percent second weekend drop. This thing is officially a bomb.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: WayAbvPar on November 13, 2013, 01:23:59 PM Heh. 62 percent second weekend drop. This thing is officially a bomb. Maybe they can package it with the Atlas Shrugged series and then we can gas the whole theatre. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on November 13, 2013, 02:23:06 PM Oh, not sure that's fair. I've boycotted it, but the subject matter's not quite the same !
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: NowhereMan on November 17, 2013, 12:41:42 AM It's not a classic by any means but I thought it was a decent adaptation of a book (and considering the source material and being a Hollywood film it's probably a pretty great adaptation). Again saw it with someone who didn't know the story and I think they got more out of it with some gap filling from me but we both enjoyed it well enough. The nature of the film though (no immediate life or death danger, child stars in a non-child movie, etc.) means it was probably never going to be particularly successful. I could see it being the sort of thing that people would happily watch on television but aren't likely to take themselves to the cinema to see.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: dd0029 on November 17, 2013, 06:37:35 PM The middle was a decent adaptation. I thought the mind game stuff went way better than it really had any right to. The setup and the conclusion were pants on head though.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Hoax on February 15, 2014, 09:17:02 PM This was the worst movie I've seen in some time.
All I really feel the need to say is that they have Mazer Rackham flying an F-22 (or something, I don't care what kind of jet it was) in Earth's atmosphere when he defeats the Bugger's first invasion. But beyond the fact that they got basically the entire book wrong. The movie just sucked. The special effects were only special for the final segment of the movie. The battle school fights were passable visually but really failed to convey much of what was going on, why it was going on or how Ender was special. The pacing was poor, most of the scenes had very little emotional impact and heaven help you if you don't know why those scenes were being shown. This had to be as bad as Half Blood Prince in terms of movies where you are fucked if you haven't read the book. Just, yuck, really fucking awful movie. No idea why people were calling it ok. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Khaldun on February 16, 2014, 03:08:44 AM My wife and daughter just watched this, knowing nothing about the book, and were like, "Eh, it's ok", but they were 100% confused about:
1) why is Ender special at all? 2) why do they need kids? why not just let the fleet command itself? or why not train adults? Which as other folks noted here, is largely a result of the pacing of the film. But it's also a bit of a result of the book itself, and why it doesn't really stand up when you re-read it as an adult. It's really just The Last Starfighter with a bunch of extra bullying, sadism and self-pity thrown in, as far as that goes--"only you can save the universe, and all the bullies will hate you because they know it." Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Setanta on February 16, 2014, 03:41:31 AM I can't remember if I posted here but anyway, this is what my Year 9 class and I thought:
Quote Took my Year 9 English class to see this today as we studied it as a text this year. Most read it cover to cover, others had read some/most of it as it's a mixed ability class. I'll relay their views: Ender/Valentine/Petra/Graff/Mazer were great interpretations although the film would have worked without the latter because he got minimal airtime/purpose The actors who played these were spot on as were the supporting cast Bean didn't reflect Ender the way he did in the book Anderson = pointless character Battle school was underwhelming and stifled the rise of Ender from despised to revered leader. Instead it just showed him to be perfect. Bozo and team then Ender vs 2 teams leading to: Dink - WTF? Dink is the only one who actually had an idea about the adults and their games and shows that Ender is not perfect in the book - doesn't happen in the film Bozo is smaller than Ender? Was this part all supposed to be comedy? The mind game - a good interpretation but limited. It did the job - just Petra doesn't crack in the final battles. This is pivotal in the audience understanding that something is wrong. Valentine/Peter shouldn't have even been introduced for all they contribute to the film - this from a kid that struggled through the Locke and Demosthenes parts of the book yet was pissed off that it was missing. Final battle was well done but lacking in impact when Ender realises it wasn't a game. Not the actor's fault, just the lack of depth in script. Location change for finale was acceptable given movie constraints and the scene with the queen was good. We'd talked about Card's views and controversy as a class and judged the text on its merits, not the shortcomings of the author. Many liked the book, some didn't. Interestingly those that liked it were from all levels of ability. One of my less academic students was proud of the fact that he read it and enjoyed it. Overwhelmingly the consensus was that the film was enjoyable yet didn't do justice to the book. They liked it, but liked the book more (even the ones that "didn't like reading it") As excursions/lessons go, it was a good day - popcorn was ok Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Hoax on February 16, 2014, 11:20:54 AM But it's also a bit of a result of the book itself, and why it doesn't really stand up when you re-read it as an adult. It's really just The Last Starfighter with a bunch of extra bullying, sadism and self-pity thrown in, as far as that goes--"only you can save the universe, and all the bullies will hate you because they know it." I dislike Card the human being as much as the next guy if not more but get the fuck out of here. :oh_i_see: Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Khaldun on February 16, 2014, 08:05:56 PM I just re-read it recently and really it is ultimately not at all clear even in the book:
a) why it's got to be kids except for Card's hand-wavy, vague ideas that in his future there is a sort of unspecific eugenics that is breeding kids who are so much smarter than everyone else that they can do stuff ordinary military guys can't do; b) which is further expressed with the Peter and Valentine stuff that almost everyone now agrees is just kind of :uhrr:, since no amount of eugenics is going to create kids who can take over world politics with two blogs c) the alleged greatness of the kids in Battle School is mostly expressed or explored in terms of a physical game that has tactical components--when there really is almost nothing about the kids that is alleged to be physically extraordinary, it's supposed to be about their minds and personalities. And really none of them besides Ender, Bean, Petra and Dink seem to be in any sense beyond being ordinary bright kids, if that. None of them besides Ender and his friends seem to have much in the way of tactical insights or emotional intelligence. Ender is made extraordinary in a program that's supposedly built around recruiting extraordinary kids by making almost all the other kids fairly ordinary. Now the book does do a much, much better job than the movie at giving some legs to Ender's genius (tactical, emotional, etc.) and I suppose you could argue that the whole program was essentially a stupid failure under Ender showed up, which is pretty much what Colonel Graff *does* argue on multiple occasions. But that undercuts a lot of the limited world-building that Card does. In the end, it really is just a very elaborate kind of power fantasy meant to stroke the egos of bullied young geeks. (Certainly that's why I liked it back in the day.) Speaker For the Dead is another matter--that's where Card really transcended his own limitations and made much of Ender's Game payoff in a distinctive way. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Trippy on February 16, 2014, 08:38:26 PM It's been a long time since I've read the book but I thought there was an element of anti-orthodoxy to using children -- as in they weren't already indoctrinated in traditional strategies and tactics like the adults were.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: RhyssaFireheart on February 17, 2014, 07:20:36 AM Yeah, I think it was kids because of the flexibility of their thinking versus stuck in traditional modes of thought like adults. Similar to how learning a second (or third, etc.) language is much easier when you're under age 10 rather than when thought processed have settled after that age.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Soulflame on February 17, 2014, 08:04:09 AM Also, I think there was some belief that adults would realize at some point that it wasn't a game, whereas Ender didn't know until he was told. Which probably would have prevented the adult from being able to give the command to destroy the planet. Of course, this brings up the question of why an adult was able to carry out that command...
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: tazelbain on February 17, 2014, 08:08:59 AM The movie emphasizes genocide that I don't remember the first book did. I am going go with whole point was try and absolve humanity of guilt of genocide that "needed" to happen. "Look, we didn't want to murder an entire race of sentient beings, but the genius kid did it. Whelp, that's the way the cookie crumbs."
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Soulflame on February 17, 2014, 08:15:05 AM Speaker for the Dead quite explicitly did go into xenocide, and humanity felt guilt over wiping out an entire alien species. Of course, that was Andrew's doing. Him and his silly book.
But yes. In the movie, the powers that be of humanity felt it was "us or them". Humanity didn't know once the alien queens discovered that each human was a separate thinking creature, they resolved to never attack humanity again. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on February 17, 2014, 08:17:04 AM Which was just bollocks, really.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Soulflame on February 17, 2014, 08:19:50 AM That may well be. I mean, the queens should have realized that we're a bunch of nasty hairless apes that won't tolerate a competitive species flying around space. Particularly one that had made two decent attempts at genociding us.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on February 17, 2014, 08:21:45 AM I found the whole idea of 'race figures out motives doesn't bother to figure out communication' essentially ridiculous later on.
Especially when we see that it's so fucking easy to have mind to mind contact as long as you're THE CHOSEN ONE. :uhrr: Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Khaldun on February 17, 2014, 08:24:15 AM It's actually kind of ambivalent in the book. There is one sense in which Graff and the others are saying, "Look, we don't know what we need to defeat the Formics, because we're too old-school. Only Mazer Rackham was able to get beyond our limits the last time, this time we need a bunch of people who can think completely differently." Ok. That's how Graff justifies just leaving the Battle School kids to make up their own rules and do their own thing, but you know, that freedom is pretty limited--they're still being told what to do and when to do it, under standard military discipline, most of the time. So this doesn't entirely make sense. In one reading, that's where the genocide comes from: they don't know Ender is going to do that, because they don't know anything about what he's doing to do, only that he will do whatever is needed to do to win. The reason Ender uses the Little Doctor from this angle is something that Graff and the others didn't know in advance: that the Formics would gather up around their home planet in such enormous numbers that there is no way for the fleet to win otherwise. Remember, Ender thinks it's a cheat--that this is another example of the teachers trying to make it impossible for him to win. So he does the only thing he could.
But yeah, if you read the scene carefully in the book, Mazer and Graff both seem kind of unsurprised by the use of the Little Doctor to commit genocide, so you have to wonder: were they just setting Ender up to do something that adults would have either refused to do or would have at least wanted to debate? Which also then does raise a question that's never answered precisely in the original book about how the control systems that Ender's group are using actually work--are they orders translated by ansible to military commanders who have choices about whether to obey or not, or are they actually in some sense controlling the fleet semi-directly? Card can't spill the details because we're supposed to believe, like Ender, that this is one more training exercise. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: tazelbain on February 17, 2014, 08:31:04 AM That's kinda the whole point sci-fi. Contrived bullshit to explore situations that otherwise can't be.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on February 17, 2014, 08:53:44 AM Graff was NEVER EVER surprised that Ender did it. He knew Ender would do it. He wanted Ender to do it.
This is Enders MO - He destroys opponents. It's made very explicitly clear. Whether he understands it or not (and that's another bit of bullshit for another day) that's what he does. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Samwise on February 17, 2014, 09:03:34 AM But yes. In the movie, the powers that be of humanity felt it was "us or them". Humanity didn't know once the alien queens discovered that each human was a separate thinking creature, they resolved to never attack humanity again. Interestingly, the later books suggested at one point that the individual buggers were a little more intelligent than the queens let on they were. Especially when we see that it's so fucking easy to have mind to mind contact as long as you're THE CHOSEN ONE. Welllp.... they way he explained that, the queens started building that "bridge" when Ender first showed up and they realized he was a threat, and they didn't manage to get it working well enough to communicate with him until after it was too late. It wasn't ever portrayed as being easy. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Merusk on February 17, 2014, 09:19:34 AM Which also then does raise a question that's never answered precisely in the original book about how the control systems that Ender's group are using actually work--are they orders translated by ansible to military commanders who have choices about whether to obey or not, or are they actually in some sense controlling the fleet semi-directly? Card can't spill the details because we're supposed to believe, like Ender, that this is one more training exercise. IIRC this is covered in the book. Ender bitches at one point in time about what bullshit it is that sometimes he'd give orders that his "drones" would ignore or would flub or react too slowly. So while he had full command of doctrine individual leaders could still go rogue or break and/or panic. I always imagined the Little Doctor was purely at Ender's control, though. A remote device built in to the flagship under his total control. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Samwise on February 17, 2014, 10:39:18 AM I always imagined the Little Doctor was purely at Ender's control, though. A remote device built in to the flagship under his total control. The way the MD Device worked IIRC was that every individual ship in the fleet was equipped with it, and to make it "go" you needed to have two ships on opposite sides of a large mass activate it to start the chain reaction that would wipe out everything until there wasn't enough mass available to keep it going. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on February 17, 2014, 11:12:32 AM But yes. In the movie, the powers that be of humanity felt it was "us or them". Humanity didn't know once the alien queens discovered that each human was a separate thinking creature, they resolved to never attack humanity again. Interestingly, the later books suggested at one point that the individual buggers were a little more intelligent than the queens let on they were. Especially when we see that it's so fucking easy to have mind to mind contact as long as you're THE CHOSEN ONE. Welllp.... they way he explained that, the queens started building that "bridge" when Ender first showed up and they realized he was a threat, and they didn't manage to get it working well enough to communicate with him until after it was too late. It wasn't ever portrayed as being easy. Yeah, yeah and it created Jane and blah blah fucking blah. I can't do this anymore, I'm not 12. It's just shite. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Samwise on February 17, 2014, 11:57:35 AM Aren't you still tuning in for Doctor Who?
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Khaldun on February 17, 2014, 05:56:12 PM Completely agree that Graff pushed Ender to be the guy who would do whatever whatever. But it's not clear that he knows what whatever whatever is going to be in the end, either he or Mazer--they're pointing Ender at the problem and saying, "we just need you to be the guy who does whatever whatever". But given that they know that the fleet is equipped with something that can kill a planet, it would be fairly stupid if it didn't occur to them in advance that whatever whatever could include killing the shit out of all the bugs. Which does raise questions about the crazy contrivances of the plot. It kind of takes someone watching a movie that is semi-loyal to the book to ask, "Wait, so why is all this shit happening?" And no, that's not all SF.
Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Ironwood on February 18, 2014, 06:28:41 AM Aren't you still tuning in for Doctor Who? :awesome_for_real: Not so much. I'll give Capaldi a try, since he's a local boy. I usually just google Coleman and watch the gifs. Title: Re: Ender's Game Post by: Venkman on March 01, 2014, 04:34:18 PM Finally had a flight long enough for this to make my list.
I thought most of the acting sucked but otherwise the movie wasn't a travesty. I don't remember the first book well enough to nitpick what they changed. I do think they established well enough that Ender was different from everyone else, even if most of it was hamfisted by cutscenes of people talking about how different he was :oh_i_see: So my only issue was in the acting (which I assume was in direction, not in talent) |