Ender’s Game Review: Visually Impressive But Not Memorable

There is no doubt that Orson Scott Card 1985 racy science fiction novel about militarizing children to fight interplanetary battles with video game-like technology was ahead of its time. Probably with the democratization of technology and the fact that kids these days are born almost with an innate capability to adapt to it very quickly, this scenario appears disturbingly more possible. The film adaptation of Ender’s Game is more of a luscious parade of astonishing CGI than about thought provoking commentary on the ethics of using the young to fight humanity’s battles. Think The Hunger Games meets Tron in a War of the Worlds scenario.

The standard misfit, overly intelligent, hero with a dark family past, always needed for this type of stories, is Ender (Asa Butterfield), one must point out that the name is a bit on the nose. He is part of a program that trains young kids over, basically, their entire lives to turn them into cyber killing machines, a program commanded by strict Colonel Graff (Harrison Ford) with the help of the more humane Major Gwen Anderson (Viola Davis). Ender is beyond good, he is perfect to be a leader and save the planet from the ant-like alien creatures know as Formics, who fought a war with humans 50 years before Enders time. But in order for the prodigy to fulfill his destiny the program must isolate him from family, deny him friendships, and manipulate everything around him to make his teammates follow him.

Asa is good in the role, and the elaborated zero gravity training sequences are truly impressive proof of the level of complexity that visual effects have reached, still there is a layer of sophistication that got lost in the translation from the pages to the screen. Even if the quote that defines the story, the one about knowing your enemy so well you end up loving him, is included, there is little development on the philosophical aspect of these pre-teens fighting giant bugs with iPads. Crowd-pleasing, yet devoid of much that can transcend into more than another science fiction flick lost in the history of cinema, it is merely forgettable.

Some of coolest segments are the futuristic interactive video game vignettes that attempt to make a connection between the enemy and the hero, but nothing can save this film from its contrived ending. Just when the climax of the film comes down, another plot point is introduced. Ender’s quest to try to make amends with his victim sets the film up for a sequel in a rather unsurprising manner a la Ridley Scott in Prometheus. A film for the fans of the book that really just want to see the shining lights and explosive visuals. Everyone else can pass.

Ender’s Game lands on theaters Nov. 1, 2013.