Ender's Game: a worthy adaptation of a classic tale?

"This is not a game."

Set a century in the future, an unusually brilliant young man, Andrew 'Ender' Wiggin, is recruited and trained to lead Earth space forces in a final battle against an alien race.

For those of you unaware, Ender's Game is based on the 1984 military sci-fi novel of the same name by author Orson Scott Card. The highly-successful book spawned several sequels following Ender's later exploits as an adult. These dealt with the ramifications of Ender's actions in the original novel and his taking on the role of 'speaker for the dead'. I was originally introduced to the series by my seventh grade English teacher, and after a pretty long hiatus, I started re-reading them in anticipation of this movie. If you're looking for something new to read with really well-developed characters and a highly-engaging story, check out this series.

As far as book adaptations go, Ender's Game is surprisingly close to its source material -- it probably helped that the original author co-produced the film, but even so, it's unusual to find 'good' adaptations of even the best novels. For example, for those of you familiar with Burroughs' classic novel A Princess of Mars and it's recent Disney film adaptation, you know what I mean.

As close an adaptation as it is, Enter's Game does condense the plot considerably to fit a two-hour window, but manages to do so without loosing too much of the original story. I'm pleased to say, though, that in the process of condensing, few plot details where altered to fit the faster-paced story. The only major tradeoff is a story that feels a bit rushed and forced at times.

Aspects of the story such as Ender's time at the Battle School is (somewhat) glossed over in favor of focusing on the latter half of the novel. Other elements, like Ender's empathy for the alien queen and his relationship with Valentine, are only touched on. The book's Earth-based sub-plot involving Valentine and Peter's political writing endeavors and Peter's rise to power are completely absent. There are others, but suffice to say, it's impossible to fit a few hundred pages worth of material into a one two-hour movie. Overall, the producers did a decent job of finding compromise.

Like many sci-fi movies this year, Ender's Game is pretty special effects-heavy. Although the story involves very little space travel, much of the computer technology talked about in the book was updated for a 21st century audience and looks quite stunning. The film, for instance, replaces references to dots on a radar screen (in the simulator scenes) to completely immersive holographic displays controlled by hand movement. This was clearly an excuse to show off cool starship designs and space combat, but I'm definitely not complaining. It's unfortunate this movie wasn't released in 3-D since the visuals could have benefited from it.

If you're looking for a sci-fi action film, Ender's Game probably isn't for you. On the other hand, if you're a fan of the book series or like military sci-fi films, definitely check out this movie. It's taken nearly 30 years, but we finally have a fairly solid, big-screen adaptation of this classic tale and a good sci-fi film in its own right.