Film clearly aimed at kids and made by adults who don't listen to what kids say they want.

The first 45 minutes is just a kerfuffle of posturing kids, and that's a whole lot less interesting than posturing adults. I was a kid growing up in a competitive environment once and things were never as ludicrous as depicted here. A willing suspension of disbelief, or just a suspension of integrity? Nowhere is there any cerebral involvement. Sit back and enjoy the great special effects and fast forward through the boring bits --- the story.

It was always going to be a difficult book to make into a film, so I wasn't that surprised to see how disappointing this is. The book began one of the best sci fi series I've read, so perhaps the film would always be in the shadow of that.

I liked this film and I am glad that I watched it, although it is definitely significantly INFERIOR to the book. Below, more of my impressions, with very limited SPOILERS.

As probably everybody already knows, this sci-fi war film is situated in the future, years after a failed alien invasion of the Earth. Fearing that another, even deadlier invasion can take place, humanity created a powerful space fleet and trained hundreds and hundreds of thousands of soldiers and officers. But in order to lead this huge armed forces, it was decided that a new kind of generals and admirals was needed, one able to learn and adapt faster when faced by complex and always varying alien tactics of space fighting. This film tells the story of a very promising recruit, young Andrew Ender Wiggin, who may just be the future war leader of the whole humanity - if only he manages to survive the excruciatingly difficult, increasingly painful and sadistically cruel training in which complex war games play a great role...

We learn those things in the first minute of the film and about the rest I will say no more. Young Asa Butterfield who plays Ender is simply AMAZING, as good as he was in "Hugo". Harrison Ford and Ben Kingsley give a great show as his teachers, with Viola Davis and Nonso Anozie supporting them valiantly as respectively war academy main psychologist and the hulking drill sergeant. Young actresses Hailee Steinfeld and Abigail Breislin play also important roles, those of Petra, Ender's friend in academy and Valentine, Ender's older sister.

Now, this film is an adaptation of an archi-classic of Sci-Fi letters, written in 1985 by Orson Scott Card. The book "Ender's game" made quite a splash when first published and got all the yearly awards a SF book can get and it didn't age at all - in fact it is still a DARN GOOD READ. But I understand that it was not possible to make a big budget Hollywood adaptation without significant changes - and also it was probably not possible to ask the young actors to do on screen some of the things that are done in the book... For that reason, Ender from the film is a quite different character than the one from the book - he is softer, gentler, weaker, more vulnerable and lacks most of the ruthlessness described in the novel. Also, at the very end of the film, his actions are not motivated by pity and mercy as in the book but by guilt and remorse - and THAT is, I believe, the one change that was not necessary and it REALLY hurt this film.

For the needs of the film many of topics were also completely abandoned and the whole training was shortened, with especially the number of fascinating war games significantly reduced.

Still, I can not find it in my heart to take away one star from the rating, because notwithstanding all the changes, the director and the actors did a hell of a job and this film is a very pleasant watch! Excellent actors, great CGI, good action scenes, a tense and dramatic narration, very honest dialogs, all this makes "Ender's game" a good, solid Sci-Fi film - and there is not so much of them around. I warmly recommend to see it in the cinemas as long as it still play. I certainly will buy the DVD when it is available. Enjoy! Read more ›

I read and enjoyed the book. I always expect the film to be inferior to the book, but this was clearly not the case here. I thoroughly enjoyed it and was really glad that the director did not just dwell on the special effects side of things and told the story that Orson Scott Card wanted to tell. It's a brilliant story and it is not aimed at kids. People who thing this have missed the point in my opinion. There is a very strong message in the film about why we go to war and the assumptions we make. I actually thought that some parts of the film gave me a greater understanding of this and of how Ender must have felt after the events towards the end of the film. I shan't go into detail as I don't want to spoil the plot. The ending was beauty tinged with sadness. Perfectly communicated. I think that a lot of people might have been drawn to this film expecting nothing but special effects and space battles, but there is so much more to this film. Well acted, well directed, one of the best films I've seen. If you are a science fiction fan, particularly of the soft sort then don't miss this. I was glued to it all the way through.

I had no expectations of this film other than it being a bit of a sci fi romp. Haven't read the book and I'm not a huge Harrison Ford fan. It kept me watching; decent effects and a storyline with some credibility. Even though the cast are youngsters, they came across as individuals with a purpose and point.

I'm still pondering over the seeming irony of the ending, unsure whether it's extremely clever or totally daft! Overall, I enjoyed it, so worth 4*.

I have not read the book, so I had no idea what the story was about and had nothing to compare it to. Had I read the book I would not have expected the film to be anything like it because they very rarely are. I watch a film to be entertained and to switch off from reality for a few moments of the day. I found it very entertaining and very watchable. I will be watching it again in the near future too. I watch a lot of films and I thought it was well above average. It was well produced with superb CGI. The acting was good and there was a nice twist in the tail at the end of the film. Overall I thought it was good enough for 5-stars.

"Ender's game" by Orson Scott Card was first published in 1977 as a short story, and the author expanded it to a full length novel by the same name published in 1985. It is regarded by many people including myself as one of the greatest SF novels ever written. Some elements of the film are also taken from Card's parallel novel, "Ender's Shadow."

This review of the 2013 film version, which has just come out on disc, is based on watching it on Blu-Ray at home with my family.

I don't think the film is quite up to the level of brilliance of the books. Some of the most visionary aspects of the novels, such as the way it foresaw the role of online debate and discussion at a time when the World Wide Web was barely a twinkle in Tim Berners-Lee's eye, do not make it into the film. A viewer who has not read the book would have no conception that the hero's brother and sister, who are major characters in the book and sequels but minor ones in this film, are as influential in their own right in the history of the "Enderverse" as he is.

Nevertheless this film is a pretty good stab at bringing to the screen the central plot of the original short story and many of the moral dilemmas and challenges of the full novels - and I don't think you could have fitted much more of the book into a film of this duration. The plotting is reasonably tight and keeps the action going, a lot of the acting is excellent, and the special effects which show space travel, a "battle school" on a giant orbiting space station, and finally space battles, are brilliant.

The premise for the story is that earth has been at war for decades with an alien race who originally attempted to invade our planet and were beaten back at great cost. The insectlike alien enemy are usually referred to in the film and in some of the more recent books in the series as "Formics" - in the book they were usually referred to as "bugs" or a ruder, similar word. Presumably the more polite term has been adopted to reduce charges of Xenophobia. In fact neither the books nor the film are at all Xenophobic, but one of the moral issues both address is whether fear and hatred are the only possible response to the enemy and whether mankind might be too quick to assume that the extermination of one or other race are the only possible outcomes of the war.

The human government has decided, for reasons which will become clear, that to win the war it is necessary to start training the best potential commanders to lead Earth's military while they are still children. The story is set at "Battle School" and then "Command School" where the children with the highest military command potential are being trained to lead the fleets.

Harrison Ford plays Colonel Graff, the commander of Battle School, whose job is to pick the boys and girls who will lead Earth's forces to victory or defeat and is determined to develop the best and most ruthless commanders no matter how much pressure he puts these children under: Voila Davis plays Major Gwen Anderson, Bettle School's psychologist who is horrified by how far Graff is prepared to go.

Asa Butterfield plays Ender Wiggin, the boy who Graff is trying to turn into a new Ceasar or Napoleon - and who is sharp enough to respond, when Graff shares that aim with him, that Ceasar was assassinated by his own people and Napoleon failed. Ben Kingsley plays the older Mazer Rackam who becomes Ender's final teacher (the younger Rackham who defeated the original Formic attack is portrayed by Kyle Clements).

Aramis Knight plays Bean, Ender's lieutenant and the closest thing he has to a friend, who is the viewpoint character of the book "Ender's Shadow."

I though the acting by Butterfield, Ford, Davis and Kingsley was superb - Butterfield and Ford were both nominated for acting awards for their performances in this film.

I'm trying to think of a way to give this film a fair rating without damning it with faint praise. I did enjoy it, while my 12 year old son thought it was brilliant and is desperately hoping there will be a sequel.

That may be difficult this time around - not least because the other books in the series would be even harder to film than "ENder's Game" which the author and others have been trying to turn into a film for a long time.

I don't believe this will be the last film version of "Ender's Game" that I shall see. Gavin Hood and his colleagues have shown that it is possible to produce an entertaining film version of this book. Sooner or later, and probably within my lifetime, another director and studio will be unable to resist the challenge to see if they can produce a brilliant one. Read more ›