Is this actually true? If so, then I might actually consider watching this movie. Won't buy any of the guy's books tho.
....
According to the Wrap, insiders have suggested that Card's deal with producers does not include "backend", ie, a percentage of the money taken at the box-office. Card, however, has still apparently banked a $1.5m fee,
paid to him when the book was optioned in 1996.
http://www.theguardian.com/film/201...ard-enders-game-profit-harrison-ford-anti-gay
I hate the idea of posting rationalizations but I look at it as a matter of considering "the remove". How removed is this work from Orson Scott Card, the polemicist? And then there's the historical remove. While it's still painful to watch the racism/politics embedded in "A Birth of a Nation", it's an important piece of film making. Long story short, SF is built on the shoulders of giants, who like everyone else have/had feet of clay. I guess if you see this film in that light, as building on the worthy aspects of a popular story, then it's enjoyable.
Thought experiment: If you found a manuscript from a very famous, but morally dubious writer, who's been dead a hundred years, would you be ok with letting it loose on the world even though it's tinged with every objectionable attitude you can think of? Sexism, a caricature of a gay character, colonialism, "light racism", glorifying violence and militarism. But other than that it's a hell of a yarn!
Some studio wants to buy it from you and they assure they'll work around all the nasty stuff. There will be good, and strong, women, gay, and native, characters. They'll just keep the thrilling plot, the swashbuckle, the dialog, and the settings. They're banking on the authors fame and finding his lost manuscript.
You see their script and it looks great. Do you let the world have it? Do you burn the original or give it to a museum? Do you publish it?
Is any of that relevant to this topic as Orson Scott Card is alive and well and getting publicity from this movie? But is even that, ironically, "a good thing" as it gets all the controversy around his thinking out there?
As I wrap this up I have to wonder, the movie belonged to the producers, without looking heavy handed couldn't they have tossed in a nod to the controversy by having a minor character that goes against Card's way of looking at gays? I'm assuming such isn't there. Been a long time sine I read the book. But if this movie is seen by Card as representative of his world view, and if it contains the icky parts of that world view, then I can see giving it a pass.
All of this could have been thoroughly discussed by the producers. But then again, maybe it's up to the audience to make their own informed choice, and to not have the ramifications of appreciating any controversial work of art spoon fed to them. Maybe there's a utility to not always drawing lines that separate us into factions of those who are acceptable, and those who aren't.
Maybe it's a victory to tolerate, or even be
accepting of, this work by Orson Scott Card.
