By Price Zimmer ’14 | Entertainment Editor

An ultimately dissatisfying action film that does not approach the quality of the Orson Scott Card novel on which it is based, “Ender’s Game” is an unremarkable children’s action flick with only the faintest whispers of the best aspects of the original work.

Centering on the journey of tactical genius and titular character Andrew “Ender” Wiggin, the movie fairly accurately follows the major events of the novel; Ender is ostracized because of his status as a third-child (and genius) in an utilitarian society that results from an alien invasion of beings called “Formics”. He is taken into Earth’s upper atmosphere and learns how to fight in an ultra-competitive, zero-gravity boot camp that trains genius children to fight the Formics when the time comes.

All of this is brought to the screen with some very solid special effects and cinematography that is visually pleasing; the Formics and the spacecraft are seen far too little, because they do have a distinct and unique visual flair. Writer and director Gavin Hood also stages some fun but all too-infrequent action scenes that take place in zero-gravity, which have a visual style that is reminiscent of this year’s “Gravity”.

However, the main shoulders on which much of the criticism rightly falls are those of Hood. “Ender’s Game” feels like a checklist of major plot points and is so lacking in any definable trait to endear the audience to these plot points that any genuine emotional impact is sucked out of the audience.  The script may have been better if it altered the story more to preserve the themes of the novel as well as provide more action on the whole; instead, the film plods along and never builds up to anything.

In defense of “Ender’s Game”, the performance given by Asa Butterfield of “Hugo” wows as Ender and Hollywood legend Harrison Ford follows suit as Ender’s recruiter/mentor, Coronel Hyrum Graff. Butterfield demonstrates that he has the acting chops to potentially be more than a child star, while Ford is reliable as always and thankfully lays of his usual gruff-voice enough to be taken seriously. Unfortunately for veteran actors Ben Kinsley and Viola Davis, who also turn in fine performances, their character’s roles go nowhere and  were made superfluous by the script, as were the siblings of Ender, Peter and Valentine Wiggin played by Jimmy Pinchak and Abigail Breslin respectively.

Fans of the novel and subsequent series created by Card will surely be the most disappointed, as the movie guts much of what made the series memorable and enjoyable. Everything from important crenels of characterization to large swaths of action and even the secondary story that focused on Ender’s brother and sister are gone, leaving only a very hollow shell of the visionary work of science fiction.

On the whole, “Ender’s Game” will provide entertainment from solid performances and fairly good graphics. Yet, the film fails at providing anything more meaningful and does not differentiate itself from the average action film while also alienating the readership of the novel by not touching upon any of the core themes or characterizing in an enjoyable way.

Grade: D+. This is a movie that merits a rental for some fun family entertainment, but does not have much else to offer and is ultimately a major disappointment.