I really, really loved Ender’s Game, and if you want to check out my review of the Blu-ray release, you can check it out on Hollywood Outbreak. One of the great aspects of covering the title, which was released this week, was covering the press day that was held at Digital Domain.
For a couple of hours, journalists and bloggers checked out how the Zero-G special effects were created by Digital Domain, and although the process is captured on one of the Blu-ray featurettes, actually checking things out at Digital Domain was a pretty memorable experience.
Although Ender’s Game director Gavin Hood was on hand to talk about how he and his team visualized the mouse and monster tablet game that’s featured in the film, my favorite part of the day came when stunt coordinators Garrett Warren and Kurt Lott explaining how a lollipop arm was used to maneuver the actors around the film’s battle room. Actor Moises Arias, who plays Ender’s (Asa Butterfield) ego driven nemesis in the film, was on hand to demonstrate how to move around the arm.
I gave the contraption a bit of a spin, and although Lott told me to use my core and to make subtle movements during my trial run, I ended up flopping around like a dying, bloated fish. During my couple of minutes on the arm, I inadvertently flipped several times and failed to heed Lott’s careful instructions. So I really won’t be putting that embarrassing video for public consumption. All you need to know is that navigating on the lollipop takes a healthy amount of balance, coordination, and strength, so much credit goes to the actors who appeared to float through the air with the greatest of ease during the battle room scenes.
If you want to see how to properly do a stunt, here’s a video of Warren (he’s the one explaining how the rig works), Lott, and Arias showing how to kick some Ender’s Game a** on the lollipop arm.
