Amph Ender's Game, 2013: believe it when you see it

Asa Butterfield cast in sci-fi film Ender's Game

Oy. I can't get excited any more by Ender's Game movie news. Well, a little bit. Enough to post a new thread.

Alright, I am excited, but not because I necessarily believe it's actually going to happen. Orson Card is a wiser man now, perhaps. Buggers are now "Formics" for reasons that are fairly obvious.

If I were doing this, I'd get the guy who directed the Swedish "Let the Right One In" to direct. That's the tone the movie needs.

 

And suddenly a hundred million British comedian jokes were silenced before they could begin.

 

At last! Hope they do it right, and that the kid playing Ender is good (and the other kids as well, obviously).

 

Remember when it was going to be Jake Lloyd?

 

So, the gate is down again?

 

I read that Asa Butterfield (Hugo, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas) was being considered for the role. That'd be cool.

 

Isn't this book classified as unadaptable?

 

The enemy's gate is always down.

 

Um, the link in the first post confirms that he's been cast as Ender...

 

The latest news, Harrison Ford has allegedly joined Ender's Game as Col. Graff. Abigail Breslin and Hailee Steinfeld, precocious Oscar nominees both, have also apparently joined the cast. "Allegedly" because, well, it's still Ender's Game we're talking about, the perpetually in development unfilmable story that could easily cost $300 million to do right.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/sns-201112211658reedbusivarietynvr1118047827dec21,0,5394441.story

I'm happy to see Harrison Ford back in the sci fi game, even if it's only produced Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, Cowboys & Aliens so far (by the way, finally saw Cowboys & Aliens--didn't seem all that awful to me - only the Olivia Wilde character was a complete waste of narrative).

No matter what, Harrison Ford brings the requisite sci fi credibility to this project. I hope the news is true. Yet another Christmas Miracle.

 

Plus, you know for sure how it finally got greenlit. Someone pitched it as Hogwarts in Space. With Quidditch!

 

Psh, what kind of losers click on links?

 

Good point.

 

I wouldn't think so, no. The ending would probably piss a lot of people off, but the book itself is nowhere near as "impossible" as adapting, say, The Silmarillion would be.

 

Agreed. The plot is fairly straightforward - I think the biggest challenge with the adaptation would be finding enough good child actors who'd make believable child geniuses and would be able to carry the plot.

 

Just hire the cast from Super Eight.

Haley Joel Osment might be a good pick for this. His "nine year old boy" acts more like a "forty-seven-year-old man" anyway.

 

Yesterday there was what looked like an official announcement that Ben Kingsley has joined the cast as Mazer Rackham.

I don't know about the director, but we couldn't ask for a better cast:

Harrison Ford - Colonel Hyram Graff
Asa Butterfield - Ender Wiggin
Abigail Breslin - Valentine Wiggin
Hailee Steinfeld - Petra Arkanian
Ben Kingsley - Mazer Rackham
Moises Arias - Bonzo
Aramis Knight - Bean
Jimmy 'Jax' Pinchak - Peter Wiggin

What kind of budget does this movie need? With Harrison Ford and Ben Kingsley in it I assume they have some serious cash behind it. Even Cowboys & Aliens allegedly had a budget of more than $150 million, and to be honest that movie looked kind of cheap.

This is one that could actually be fantastic shot in native 3D a la Avatar or the Hobbit.

 

I'm pretty happy with the cast. This was the first sci fi book I ever read so it always has been special for me. I wouldn't be shocked if the ending was changed though for mass consumption. I bet it would piss people off after 2 hours in the theater. I just downloaded it on my Kindle a few days ago, I haven't read this book in forever.

 

Casting looks good. I'd still love to see them play it straight --we see nothing but simulator battles. Ender's reaction to the news is the "I am your father" moment of the book. Don't screw it up, please!

I wonder if they will include the mind game.

 

I don't think it necessarily needs a particularly hefty budget. It's been quite a few years since I read the book, but iirc all of the action scenes besides the shower fight and a couple of training scenes happen on computer screens.

Thinking about this offhand-I'm not at all sure what audience reaction might be. It's not exactly the most action-packed science fiction novel, and the ending (in the novel anyway) is just a WHAT moment.

 

whoops.

 

Hey, this is Hollywood. They've changed tons of endings on books adapted from movies.

 

The zero gravity battle room fights are the critical Quidditch games for Hogwarts in Space. That would mean months of kids on wires suspended in front of green screens and hopefully some high end digital effects to go with that.

There are a few ways to handle the narration for the movie adaptation. One would be to let the audience in on the secret in advance. That would probably require cutting between the kids on the simulators and the actual battles, upping the effects budget.

Another would be to take more of a Sixth Sense/Twilight Zone approach of breaking the news to Ender and the audience at the same time. That would save some money, but there's no way around the battle room sequences.