Review of Ender's Game (2013) by Thegodfatherson — 01 Nov 2013

Ender’s Game vacillates between grand, sweeping space vistas and tight, penetrating close ups, mostly on Butterfield’s steely gaze. If you’re into meticulously rendered computer generated space, well then, a good 60% of Ender’s Game is for you.

And if you’re by chance also into moral grey areas concerning the mental manipulation of children in war, then a minute percentage of screen time will work for you as well. But in the end, the film struggles to condense too much material into a two-hour run time.

The book spanned six years, while the film packs all that into just about one year. With that much emotional ground to cover and a plot punctuated by long, computer-generated battle sequences, the story suffers from a lack of a sense of urgency and some seemingly forced character growth.

Not even Sir Ben Kingsley as the legendary General Mazer Rackham could lend enough gravity to a story that very nearly gets lost in space.