Ender's Game (2013)

Young Ender Wiggin is recruited by the International Military to lead the fight against the Formics, a genocidal alien race which nearly annihilated the human race in a previous invasion.

Director:

Gavin Hood

Writers:

Gavin Hood (screenplay by), Orson Scott Card (based on the book Ender's Game by)

Stars:

Harrison Ford, Asa Butterfield, Hailee Steinfeld

1 win & 6 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Asa Butterfield	...	Ender Wiggin
Harrison Ford	...	Colonel Graff
Hailee Steinfeld	...	Petra Arkanian
Abigail Breslin	...	Valentine Wiggin
Ben Kingsley	...	Mazer Rackham
Viola Davis	...	Major Gwen Anderson
Aramis Knight	...	Bean
Suraj Partha	...	Alai (as Suraj Parthasarathy)
Moises Arias	...	Bonzo Madrid
Khylin Rhambo	...	Dink Meeker
Jimmy 'Jax' Pinchak	...	Peter Wiggin (as Jimmy Jax Pinchak)
Nonso Anozie	...	Sergeant Dap
Conor Carroll	...	Bernard
Caleb J. Thaggard	...	Stilson (as Caleb Thaggard)
Cameron Gaskins	...	Slattery (Leopard Army)

Storyline

The Earth was ravaged by the Formics, an alien race seemingly determined to destroy humanity. Fifty years later, the people of Earth remain banded together to prevent their own annihilation from this technologically superior alien species. Ender Wiggin, a quiet but brilliant boy, may become the savior of the human race. He is separated from his beloved sister and his terrifying brother and brought to battle school in orbit around earth. He will be tested and honed into an empathetic killer who begins to despise what he does as he learns to fight in hopes of saving Earth and his family.

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Plot Keywords:

alien | future | simulation | training | manipulation | 

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Taglines:

The future must be won

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Genres:

Action | Fantasy | Sci-Fi

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Motion Picture Rating (MPAA)

Rated PG-13 for some violence, sci-fi action and thematic material.

Details

Official Sites:

Official Facebook Official Google+

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

1 November 2013 (USA)

Also Known As:

El juego de Ender

Filming Locations:

Michoud Assembly Facility - 13800 Old Gentilly Road, New Orleans, Louisiana, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$110,000,000 (estimated)

Opening Weekend USA:

$27,017,351, 3 November 2013, Wide Release

Gross USA:

$61,737,191

Cumulative Worldwide Gross:

$125,537,191

Company Credits

Production Co:

MWM (MadisonWellsMedia), Summit Entertainment, Chartoff Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

114 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital Datasat Dolby Atmos Auro 11.1 Dolby Surround 7.1 Sonics-DDP SDDS 12-Track Digital Sound IMAX 6-Track

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Asa Butterfield grew 3 inches during the filming.

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Goofs

When Bonzo is marching with the Salamander army and his cadence as they march to the game... when he gets onto the platform it is clearly visible that he is still singing the cadence but his lips do not move.

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Quotes

[first lines]
Ender Wiggin: Fifty years ago an alien force known as the Formics attacked Earth. Tens of millions died. It was only through the sacrifice of our greatest commander that we avoided total annihilation. We've been preparing for them to come back ever since. The International Fleet decided that the world's smartest children are the planet's best hope. Raised on war games, their decisions are intuitive, decisive, fearless. I am one of those recruits.

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Crazy Credits

There are no opening credits. The film's title doesn't appear until the start of the closing credits.

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Connections

Referenced in Flat Earth: The Biggest Lie of All (2015)

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Soundtracks

Peace Sword in B Minor (Open Your Heart)
Written by Wayne Coyne, Michael Ivins, Steven Drozd, Kliph Scurlock and Derek Brown
Performed by The Flaming Lips
Produced by The Flaming Lips, Scott Booker and Dave Fridmann
The Flaming Lips appear courtesy of Warner Bros. Records

User Reviews

The Game is Over

I saw Ender's Game yesterday, and if you have not seen it yet, don't bother. If you know the books, you will hate it, it's the worst movie adaptation of a novel since "Sum Of All Fears" and almost (but not quite) as bad as the "Dune" movie.

If you don't know the books, then you won't know what is going on.

Worst case scenario. First, they decided that it would be good if this movie could be more like the Hunger Games or Twilight series, making it into a 50% chick flick, which the original story is definitely NOT.

Lots of touchy feely hand wringing going on, particularly at the end, but without almost the entire story line regarding Ender's background or the reasoning and history behind drafting Children into the service, it all comes off as some lame plot line. And Peter has only 1 min of screen time, completely killing off that sub-plot and all of it's implications for the main story.

The heavy lifting for the plot is done by narrative, Ender's letters to Valentine, which, while it gets some badly needed explanations across, is a totally weak story telling tool, and very much a cop-out.

The Mind Game is also weakly handled, with only a few words of explanation regarding the Formic's influence on Ender through it.

At least the special effects were up to current standards, no complaints there, but making this amazing story material into something not much better than Battleship or Pacific Rim, is not something that I would be proud of as a Director.

They took a 700 page novel, made a 1hr 45min movie out of it somehow. They were forced to condense the first 600 pages into 3 or 4 spoken sentences of dialog between characters so that major (essential) plot points are at least mentioned (not that they help much). Then they take the last couple of chapters and go into more depth on that material, but by then, you don't care anymore. And if you have not read the book, at that point it will feel like some standard forgettable action flick. They go even further into the abyss by using material from the second novel to blatantly set up a sequel. It all feels so shabby and such a waste.

I originally had high hopes for this one, Harrison Ford and Ben Kingsley usually don't get involved in much crap, but they must have needed money or something because this one is crap. This will effectively kill Ender's Game for the rest of time, nobody has ever made a second version of a movie from a novel, which is what this would take to make things right. We can only hope that 75% of the movie was cut out in editing, and may be released as a Director's Cut or Extended Edition, but failing major changes in future release versions, the Game is Over.

Very sad. Great Book(s)