Ender's Game in Theaters Now

I read the book Ender's Game in preparation for watching the movie, so with that semi-fresh in my mind (read that review here), these are my thoughts on the screen adaptation.

I'm not going to go into exactly what the story is about. For that, you can read my book review or stumble upon it just about anywhere on the Internet. This will be more of a comparison review of book to movie, with emphasis on the movie.

Overall, I thought the movie stayed very true to the book with the exception that befalls all movie adaptations: that much of the book had to be compressed. Impressively, this movie is very tight and moves the plot and the action right along, clocking in at under two hours. There's no drag. On the other hand, such speed of plot leaves little room to draw out depth of character and emotion, and that's what I found lacking in the first half of this movie. If you don't already know Ender from the books, you cannot possibly grasp what he is going through in the movie. The book takes us deeply into Ender's heart and mind, and it's extremely difficult to translate something so internal into something external and visual.

(Minor SPOILERS follow in this paragraph.) I'm not sure a true translation would have been possible in the first place without making a much longer movie that might have included more of the set-up of Ender's isolation. The movie cuts out the constant set-backs Ender faces in his quest for acceptance, and without those, you don't feel his plight nearly as strongly. The movie tells us he's purposely being isolated, but it skips the parts that show it, narrowly focusing instead on the opposite: how Ender attracts his followers. Without seeing the agony of his losses, we can't fully understand the significance of his victories. In fact, if you only had the movie to go by, you would think that Ender's superior, Colonel Graff, fails in his mission to isolate Ender, but that's not quite the case in the book. So, the first half of the movie, while true to the spirit of the book, lacks some of the soul of the book.

However, the second half picked up some of the lost emotional threads I was looking for and tied them into a fabulous ending, made all the more powerful by what I already knew from the book. This is one case where I am very glad I read the book first, though sometimes I am not so finicky about that. It is possible that I read more emotion into scenes because I knew what the book contained. Even so, Asa Butterfield, except for being taller than I thought he should be (and he's definitely older than the character in the book, but to get an actor with any depth, he'd have to be), is a fantastic Ender, and he plays the emotions beautifully.

(Very minor SPOILERS in this paragraph.) In fact, I was happy with nearly all the characters. Valentine, perhaps, didn't match up with how I envisioned her, especially in the latter half of the book, but she's in the movie so little that it doesn't matter (she and Peter's roles from later in the book were one of the sacrifices made due to time constraints). Harrison Ford as Graff and Viola Davis as Anderson seemed just right. Granted, I wasn't expecting Anderson to be a woman, and Davis brings a more motherly (though still military-tough) approach to the character that I never would have envisioned from the book, but somehow it works. At least, I liked it. The other trainees with Ender don't get a ton of screen time, but we still get to see a few of the book's key moments in which certain ones become something more to Ender. However, there's no time in the movie to deal with the complications those friendships go through in the book.

Just a note about morality since that's one of my big things. I don't have anything really bad to say about the movie, but I do want to give you the basics. It's rated PG-13 for some violence and heavy thematic material. (In short, if your kid's as young as Ender is supposed to be in the story, he's probably too young to watch this!) There's bullying, manipulation, questioning of authority, calculated violence. But the whole story is one big dialog of right and wrong. For that reason, with parental guidance, of course, I think some younger ages (middle school especially) can handle, or even should be allowed to handle, this. There's a lot to talk about.

Finally, I just enjoyed the look of the movie, the tech, the battle room, the aliens. It was all well done, and nothing seemed too amiss when compared to what I had envisioned in the book.

Though the first half of the movie leaned more toward three stars for me, the second half brought it overall to four stars. When the credits finally rolled, I had shed a few tears and just needed time to process the whole thing. There's this beauty to the story that the movie manages to capture a small part of, and it's timeless too. Several decades since the book's first publication haven't lessened its relevance and impact. I'm happy to see this story on the screen, despite being only a very recent fan, but I do highly recommend that you enjoy the book first.

Ender's Game

I'm back! It's been a crazy busy summer, and though I've been reading less than normal, I still have a handful of books and more than a handful of movies to potentially review. For now, I will start with the latest book I've read and possibly work backward from there, if life permits.

After enjoying Pathfinder, by Orson Scott Card, some friends encouraged me to also read Ender's Game, by the same author. But I confess, though I put it on my list, I didn't get seriously interested until I knew a movie adaptation was going to be made. Then, the only question was, should I read it beforehand or after? There are distinct advantages to each for a person who loves both movies and books. I opted for the book first this time, wanting to get into it and be surprised as I read, rather than getting the surprises out of the way in two hours and then going back and reading about how it all took place. I don't like spoilers. Having read it this close to when the movie comes out, I suppose I will probably be slightly disappointed with the movie. It's best to put some time between a book and a movie, I think. That way, you can enjoy both more fully and give the movie credit for being its own thing, rather than comparing two different story mediums that really aren't meant to be the same. On a side note, that's why I'm not going back and re-reading Catching Fire before the movie comes out in November. I don't remember much of the book, so the story will be fresh for me again. Then, I'll go back and enjoy a more leisurely pace through the details of the book afterward.

Ender's Game did not disappoint. It's an interesting genre, definitely science fiction but not necessarily young adult (and for sure not middle school), even though the story is about a young kid. Often, when you have a young protagonist, the book is automatically categorized as young adult, and perhaps that exactly what Ender's Game is to some, but it's a good example of a story that transcends both age limits and, almost miraculously for sci-fi, time periods. For instance, it was written in the 70's, but there's a very good grasp of the possibilities of computer technology and virtual reality. It's also just vague enough not to date itself, at least not too much.

Ender's Game is about a six-year-old boy, nicknamed Ender, who's a genius selected for training in Battle School to defeat a race of aliens called Buggers that almost wiped Earth out at one time. The theory is that a child with an adaptable mind is needed to confront the enemy, who anticipates actions and adapts quickly itself. So, little boys are monitored, and if they qualify, they are sent to space to train in battle games and learn how to work together or, in Ender's case, to lead. The odds are purposefully stacked against Ender to draw out his strengths as quickly as possible because the final war with the Buggers is nearly upon them, and it's kill all or all be killed.

What sets this book apart from young adult is that it's not written to a six-year-old audience. It's barely written to a young adult audience. In fact, Ender thinks and speaks like a middle school child at only 6, and there's precious little for same-age readers (even middle schoolers) to identify with in his character. Yet, we do identify with him. He's not just a machine. He's a boy who grows up too fast and lives with the weight of the planet on his shoulders but who doesn't want to end up like his evil older brother. He knows he's not a child. He knows it's not even really a possibility. But he does long for friends, and he hates the way he's forced to dominate his competition, isolating him from his peers. This book is powerful on both thematic and emotional levels, drawing tears to my eyes as I read. There isn't even romance, which is the typical tear-jerker stuff for me. It's about the bonds built between boys and peers and the bond of brother to brother and brother to sister and teacher to student and boy to duty. It's deep and heart-wrenching. It's intellectual. It's suspenseful. It's fascinating.

For its relatability to a different generation (which is extremely difficult to achieve in science fiction), for it's innovative ideas (before kids killed each other in the The Hunger Games, little children trained their childhood away in order to eventually command starships and fight aliens), for its emotional depth, and for its compelling tale, I give Ender's Game five stars and look forward to seeing how they pull it off in the movie this November, knowing it can't possibly be the same, by a long shot. However you choose to order your story mediums, be sure that if you watch the movie, you also read the book. In this case, I believe the experiences are going to be quite a bit different, and you want to get the full story, trust me.

ADDENDUM (9-25-13): If you have already read this blog once, you might notice that I changed a line in the last paragraph that could have potentially been a spoiler. I figure most people will avoid reading a review of something they are already intending to read or see, but for those of you on the line, I don't want to give away too much.

Pathfinder

I don't know why, but I tend to give established authors a wide berth. Maybe it's due simply to the circumstances in which I get most of my books (usually advance reader's copies trying to promote new authors). Sometimes a book will come through from a well-known author, and I will think to myself, I wish I read that author, but I rarely take the book to try. It would never even have occurred to me to see if I liked Orson Scott Card, and to be honest, I don't know why I picked up Pathfinder. The description was mildly interesting but nothing I would have thought I had to have.

After reading a very good book, The Iron Queen, reviewed here, I was looking for something that would engage me as much. I'm not saying I was mysteriously drawn to Pathfinder or led to read it, just that it's ironic I should choose science fiction when I am more of a fantasy reader and was looking for something as good as a story about fairies. But choose it I did. And though I cannot say I was magically drawn to the book, I can definitely say the book drew me in from the start.

Pathfinder is young adult science fiction. It tells the story of a boy from the backwoods who is unlike most of his peers. He's a trapper like his father, but unlike anyone else, he can see the paths of every living creature living before him in streaks of color before his vision. Because of it, he and his father are very good trappers, but Rigg's father is also determined to give Rigg the best schooling possible. So, while they walk the forests, he teaches Rigg about science, language, history, astronomy, physics, everything a backwoods boy should never need to know.

Then Rigg's father dies, leaving him heir to an enormous amount of wealth in the form of 19 jewels as well as a quest to find a sister he never knew he had. Accompanied by his friend Umbo, the only other boy with a special power in their little village, they head for the cities where they will need more than their abilities to help them survive.

Within the first 30 pages of this large 600-pager, the characters were so well-established I was hooked. They were real, developed, surprising, funny. They talked about bodily functions (this is a book written by a man with male protagonists). Rigg was smart and a smart aleck in an endearing way. I wanted to know more about him and his mysterious father.

Then each chapter began to start with a seemingly completely different story about a kid piloting a spaceship from a devastated Earth, hoping to jump through space to a new planet. I was intrigued about how the two stories might match up.

In Pathfinder, the mysteries keep building, but the clues are fun to follow. You should have a pretty good idea of what's going on before you get to the end. It's satisfying to figure out.

Orson Scott Card plays with time travel a great deal in this book, and not in the same way as much other science fiction. He changes the rules. But it works in its own way, even if it sometimes makes your head (and the heads of his characters) hurt. His explanations of how the science of the world works are sometimes lengthy and would have put me off if he hadn't made sure I was invested in his characters before he started giving them. Character is what makes this book work.

So, for all my male readers out there, because honestly, this book was written for you guys, see what you think of Pathfinder. It's only young adult because the protagonists are young, but it's smart and funny enough for all ages. And if you enjoy it, more of Rigg's story is on the way and shouldn't be long. Orson Scott Card wrote this one in six months!

Four stars for a book I never would have guessed I'd like.