Ender's Game (1 Viewer)

[Jacob McCraw]

I noticed on IMDB that this is slated to come out in 2006 with Wolfgang Petersen directing. Does anyone know anything about it? I always thought that animation would be the best way to bring this book to life on the screen. As I was watching "Final Fantasy" I thought that team could do a great version of Ender's Game. Please put some info in this thread as you find it out.

 

[TheLongshot]

Rather surprised that a search didn't come up with results...

Last I heard:

Card is writing a script that is a combination of Ender's Game and Ender's Shadow.

He was convinced it could be done live action after seeing after seeing actors like Jake Lloyd and Haley Joel Osment do some pretty good work for youngsters.

Beyond what you already know, I don't know if there is any more news.

Jason

 

[George See]

This is the last official word from Card on the movie.

www.frescopictures.com/movies/ender/endersgame_update.html

2006 seems a bit optimistic to me, I just hope beyond hope the movie doesn't suck.

 

[Adam_S]

Peterson is directing a remake of Poseidon adventure as a summer tentpole 06 Warner bros film.

That means active production on EG (if it's the next title Peterson selects from those being developed by his production company, Radiant Productions) will not begin until summer 2006.

Michael Dougherty and Dan Harris wrote the last three drafts of the screen play, WB and Radiant were extremely pleased with the initial results, but they were pulled by Warners to work exclusively on Superman. Radiant is probably going to spend the next few years retooling the treatment and finding new screenwriters.

It will combine some elements from Ender's Shadow to fill out the relationship between Ender and Bean.

The film should be damn good because the producers are tenacious and insistent about getting the script perfect before commencing with filming.

 

[David Rogers]

Movie has been in development hell for the better part of a decade now. It's probably never going to come out at this point; the longer it sits in limbo the bigger of a joke it becomes. Probably a good thing anyway, because based on comments by Card on prior occasions when it was about to "start production soon", the story has to be altered so dramatically for a Hollywood Mass-Release environment it would remove the impact and message.

 

[George See]

I'm not gonna give up all hope, Hitchikers Guide was in the same state for years and it's actually coming out now. So anything is possible.

 

[Carl_G]

I can't help but cringe upon hearing of a great book being dumbed down to the silver screen.

 

[George See]

As Enders game is my favorite book i'm right with you on that...but after Lord Of the Rings i'll hold out hope that a good adaptation can be made of a great book. Chances are i'm setting myself up for disapointment but i'm gonna remain optimistic on this one.

 

[David Rogers]

If they remove any of the children characters, if they remove any of Ender's scenes ... why make the movie? It won't be Ender's Game.

If they ever do get around to producing this, I will NOT see it if I hear one word of story changes from the book. There would be no point. I'm through being burned on adaptations from books I love; never again.

 

[Jack Briggs]

Well, I sort of liked the first book (Orson Scott Card is far from a favorite SF author of mine). However, a good film of this material might be interesting.

 

[Holadem]

I am about 1/3 of the way through this book, and am scratching my head as why it's considered a classic. The writing is pedestrian, and the story so far hasn't grabbed me. So, what am I missing?

--
H

 

[Jack Briggs]

Not much, Holadem. But these books certainly have garnered quite a following. Same with Kim Stanley Robinson's Red Mars and its two sequels: I don't see much really going on, and I wonder why it has achieved such popularity. Whatever. JB

 

[Patrick Sun]

I thought "Ender's Game" was a fun read, and the companion novel, "Ender's Shadow", was also pretty interesting considering it dealt with the unfolding of the same events from 2 crucial points of view for both novels. Has "Ender's Game" aged well, I think so, for the most part. A few months ago, I revisited it via books-on-cd and found the book compelling enough to at least listen to while driving around town. I found myself sitting at the parking lot waiting for a chapter break before leaving my car in some instances.

I had read "Speaker for the Dead" about 10 years ago, and just got through listening to it on books-on-cd, and it was still pretty interesting to me, even though I knew where most of the story was going on my 2nd time through, I still gleaned some tidbits I had missed on my first reading.

Card pretty much solved his problem for "Speaker For the Dead" by writing "Ender's Game" because he could never get the start of "Speaker for the Dead" going without getting bogged down, but after expanding his novella "Ender's Game" into a novel, it allowed him to write the book he wanted to write for "Speaker for the Dead". Having won both the Hugo and Nebula for "Speaker for the Dead" it had a favorable response by that community who gives out such awards. It doesn't mean it was the best sci-fi published that year, but it struck a chord with enough people to be awarded those prizes.

 

[Ted Todorov]

Nothing. But, believe it or not, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide & Children of the Mind are all good SciFi. The Earthbound books of the series (Ender's Game plus Shadow of this, that and the other thing) are all terrible by comparison.

Good SciFi is hard to find... Personally I HIGHLY recommend The Black Cloud by Fred Hoyle. His October The First is Too Late as well as Isaac Asimov's The Gods Themselves and Stanislaw Lem's Solaris are superb as well. Arthur C. Clarke's A Fall of Moondust is an enjoyable yarn and Asimov's Foundation and robot series are classics with good reason.

Ted

 

[Chris Harvey]

Given that Card has been intimately involved with the development process, including writing several early drafts of the script, how can it be considered "dumbed down", at least at this point?

From what I've read, in terms of authorial involvement with the film development process, this is closer to J.K. Rowlings' involvement with WB on the Harry Potter series (the difference being that Card has already shown a readiness to be wildly revisionist in his own screenplay adaptation -- putting what many would consider the "twist" ending of the book as one of the opening pieces to the film).

 

[Marc_Sulinski]

I have to agree with you. I thought that Ender's Game was only OK, but the subsequent books in the series are excellent. I have not read the Shadow series yet, so I cannot comment on them,

 

[Sam Favate]

My finacee gave me this book back in March, saying she enjoyed it and thought I would too. I was initially enthused because of the book's reputation and her assessment of it, but I have been disappointed. I put it down some months ago, and still have the final 50 pages to go. (anyone want to tell me what happens?) I got tired of reading about training exercises. As for filming it, it seems to me the filmmakers will have a hard time being precise since there seem to be a whole lot of naked children running around.

 

[George See]

Some of the stuff from early drafts of the screenplay will definitly scare you off then you might want to start running now. The only thing that really keeps me optimistic about all the changes i've heard about is that it's Card making the changes and not some guy in a suit at a movie studio. Douglas Adams was able to succesfully make a lot of changes to Hitchikers guide over the years for the various Radio productions/books/tv shows and they all seemed to work out.

As for Enders Game being good Sci-Fi i agree it's not the best Sci-Fi in the world, I don't even really consider it Sci-Fi I look at it as more of a character study that happens to be set in the future. I can definitly see why people might have a ho-hum reaction to it, it's not even Orson Scott Cards best book. As far as i'm concerned that honor would goto the Alvin Maker Series and/or Pastwatch. But Enders Game just keeps drawing me back in I can't get enough of it.

On a somewhat related note the first 3 chapters of the next book in the Bean series has been posted on Cards official site. www.hatrack.com

 

[David Rogers]

Ender's story touches a nerve in the kind of folks who often aren't accepted by their fellows. If you read it and don't get it, odds are you never had problems interacting with others. Odds are, you never had to deal with the burden of always knowing answers before others in school.

Can't think of how to explain it more simply than that.

 

[BlakeN]

David is dead on. I read this book for the first time about 13 years ago so I was 14 at the time. Ive since read the book at least 5 times and Ive never read another book that spoke to me as much as this one did. I would also recommend reading "The Worthing Saga" from Card as well.

Now for the movie. There is a chance a movie could do well from this book but I they will have to butcher a lot out of it. I would bet almost anything that his brother and sister would not be in the movie at all. IF they tried making Enders Game and Enders Shadow into 1 movie they would have to eliminate almost all of Bean's history just make the movie under 3 hours.