"And the old men, they march slowly, their bodies twisted and sore, the forgotten soldiers from a forgotten war, and the young people they say to me 'What are they marching for?' And I sat and ask myself the same question. And so the band it plays "Waltzing Matilda," and the old men, they still answer its call. But year after year, the numbers get fewer, and soon no one will march there at all."
Eric Bogle

So sci-fi fans, at last it's here. After nearly 30 years in the making drifting through development hell, Orson Scott Card's classic military sci-fi novel Ender's Game finally hits the multiplex, CG and all. And given what usually happens when projects drift for decades from director to director, the end result is actually pretty impressive. Well-cast, gorgeously shot, faithful to the novel, and directed with clean precision, the final product is a smart, sleek, if not quite spectacular sci-fi action film.

The story concerns Andrew "Ender" Wiggin, a child prodigy with a brilliant tactical mind being groomed as a military genius in a neo-fascist future. Mankind was devastated in a war with an alien race, and in horror that they might come back to finish the job, has decided to fight genocide with genocide and launch an attack on their home planet. But wars are won by soldiers, not technology, and they desperately need a new commander. Ender is taken from his family, including his sister Valentine (Abigail Breslin), the one person he loves, sent to battle school to be groomed as a new military master by Colonial Graft (a grizzled Harrison Ford). But Ender's killer instinct vie with his compassion, and in their desperation to stamp a new identity in place of one that isn't even full formed yet, the International Fleet may be creating an even more deadly threat than the one against which they fight as Ender begins to wonder just who his enemy really is...

Though director Gavin Hood's last Hollywood outing, the disappointing, protracted and dull X-Men Origins: Wolverine was plagued by mangled rapid-fire editing and out-of-date slow-motion fireballs left over from Steven Segal movies, Ender's Game finds the director on more comfortable footing. Full of sleek, clean lines, symmetrical architecture, and bleak landscapes, Hood's fully realized if occasionally artificial-looking sci-fi future isn't necessarily anything new, but it's visually interesting and gorgeously shot by ace DOP Donald McAlpine (and mercifully not in 3-D). The zero-gravity combat sequences are appropriately spatially interesting, and the Star Wars-style space battles are suitably tense. Hood's aesthetic, perhaps reflecting the fascist future in which the film takes place, is sleek and clean, and the actions sequences are actually coherent. Apart from a few clunky voice-over narration bits, the storyline moves very smoothly, Hood stripping away the fat for a lean, exciting story.

But it's the performances where the film really excels. Hood's eerie closeups on Butterfield's eyes as he transformers from innocent child to hardened killer are appropriately eerie, and the young actor's combination of ferocity and vulnerability is pitch-perfect. By zooming the focus in on Ender himself, Hood's pet theme of soldiers who begin to question their actions dovetails well with Card's novel. To some extent, however, while much of the fat is trimmed from the novel, it does to some extent come at the expense of some its wider implications about the way in which the many contradictory alliances and people form a web which tangles things and leads countless institutions and individuals to push towards their own ends. It also short-changes the members of Ender's platoon, all well-performed by by their respective actors, particularly a spunky Hailee Steinfeld and a brief but memorable role from Abigail Breslin as Ender's empathetic sister.

Heavyweight Ben Kingsley brings appropriate gravitas (tablet with another rather ridiculous accent) to a small but important role, but the real surprise comes in the form of sci-fi luminary Harrison Ford. Hood well-exploits his grizzled features and no-nonsense persona as a ruthlessly Machiavellian military commander, contrasted with a more compassionate Viola Davis. It's here where the film finds its central themes of warmongering, brainwashing, and fascism in this duality, confidently performed by the two heavyweight actors. If Ender's Game isn't quite as though-provoking as its source material, it's still a step above most genre movies these days, with ideas to go along with its strong performances and cool set pieces, with an intelligence which echoes if not equals the thematically similar Paul Verhoeven film Starship Troopers. Don't just do what you're told, don't just ask who's telling you, but ask why. In an age where Transformers and Battleship pass for science-fiction, Ender's Game's blend of intelligence and action are all too welcome, and the film, in spite of its flaws, comes out a winner.