Ender's Game -- Trailer

I stumbled across this film while looking at the cast of Iron Man 3, specifically, Ben Kingsley on Rotten Tomatoes. I was intrigued by the inclusion of Asa Butterfield in the cast list, cast for the second time as the title character in a film that also stars Kingsley -- the other being the impressively acted lead in Hugo. As I scrolled through the rest of the cast, I became more and more impressed and intrigued -- Harrison Ford, Hailee Steinfeld, Abigail Breslin, and Viola Davis make up the rest of the big names splashed through the cast.

Butterfield and Kingsley in Scorsese's 2011 film, Hugo. Great movie.

The interest continues to grow. I discovered this science fiction adventure is being adapted from a novel written in the 80's. I researched the book, and (along with many more discoveries I won't mention for time's sake) decided the book could be worth a read. I gave me the impression of being the space version of The Hunger Games, but written before The Hunger Games of course.

That impression came from the fact that the story is basically one kid versus the world. Ender is the kid, molded influenced and manipulated since birth by mysterious people who hope he will one day save the earth and humanity from an alien race. Something he doesn't seem to have much of a choice about.

Hailee Steinfeld and Asa Butterfield in the movie.

Though I was only mildly interested in the book, I ended up getting my hands on a copy pretty quickly, started reading a day later, and finished it two days after that. I don't want to go too much into what I thought about it, as it could easily be an entire blog post itself, and I don't want to give away any spoilers, but it was a very interesting read. And I enjoyed it, though (since I've already compared it to THG) not as much as I enjoyed The Hunger Games. After having read it though, I realize that's not a very fair comparison. So forget that. I'll just say I didn't love it, but I did read and finish it happily, and most importantly, it consumed my thoughts during the read and for several days after.

I suppose it goes without saying now that I'm very interested in seeing the film. The trailer conveniently released the day before I finished reading, so I watched it as soon as I was done, and from the little information I gathered from the one-and-a-half minutes I think that it will at least be as good as the book. I optimistically imagine it will be better, mostly because the story demands creative and amazing visual sequences... and they're looking good.

Have a look.



I knew as soon as I started reading the book that Asa Butterfield was the perfect choice for Ender, and the rest of the cast looks equally great. I'm very interested to see how it's adapted, and if I'm right as I hope I am, and the film is equal to or better than the book, I will happily consider myself a new fan of the franchise. It's scheduled to release on November 1st this year.