Writer Orson Scott Card doesn’t agree with the idea of gay marriage and his keenness to share this opinion with the world has created a great deal of trouble for Lionsgate, as various gay rights groups have threatened to boycott its $110 million movie.
The film itself — a sci-fi thriller based on Card’s 1985 novel — is a kid-centric, technically whizzy extravaganza and takes great pains to promote a brave new world. I liked it. Hero Ender is a neurotic geek forced to do battle with his peers. He isn’t as enchanting as Harry Potter nor as pioneering as The Hunger Games’ Katniss Everdeen but in his own way, he’s a winner.
In a world where children are seen as holding the key to military supremacy, 12-year-old Ender (Asa Butterfield, excellently anxious) gets headhunted by army colonel Graff (Harrison Ford, adequate). Graff wants him to lead an assault on Earth’s one-time enemy, the Formics. But first Ender must prove he’s top dog at school. Ender is not a boy’s boy. He’s puny (superheroes leave their nerdy alter-egos behind; Ender, however, never acquires a six-pack), and he’s a bit of cheater in fights. Nevertheless, his travails are gripping. Trippy scenes involving a computerised personality test are especially good: war games and mind games seamlessly entwined.
Teen sci-fi offers rich pickings for adults tired of “adult” fare. Even the film’s last third, which wastes the talents of Ben Kingsley and teeters on the brink of dullness, has a trick up its sleeve. Ender’s Game flirts with machismo, only to leave it high and dry at the altar. Game on.
