More controversy for Ender's Game? Ok, not really, as I don't think reusing disaster footage from a previous movie is particularly scandalous. Still, one Reddit user did manage to spot a glimpse of a familiar scene in the Summit film's recently released Ender's Game trailer. It looks like Summit may have dipped into at least one of its previous films to create some of the disaster footage that's revealed early on in the trailer.
It comes in at the 15-second mark in the Ender's Game trailer below:
Because it moves so quickly, here's the still Reddit user "DevelopmentFiend" shared:
And now here's the comparison they make. It's a clip from Alex Proyas' 2009 film Knowing. Note the image at the 25-second mark:
And again, you can see it better with this still:
The Ender's Game glimpse shows it looking much grainier, probably because it's revealed to us as footage being played to show something that happened in the past, as referenced by Harrison Ford's monologue, whereas the Knowing scene is present day. The buildings and angle look the same though, and considering they're both Summit films, it may be safe to assume the studio recycled the footage to create the scene. Or we could go more sci-fi with this and try to draw a bizarre connection between the Ender's Game Formics causing mass destruction to the reality in which Knowing is set. I'd have to rewatch that movie in order to concoct a more elaborate theory there. Regardless, it's a good catch by the Reddit user!
Borrowing footage from a previously produced film would be one way to save on costs, especially in producing a potentially costly destruction scene for a movie with a budget that reportedly surpassed $110 million. If the scene were a pivotal point of the movie, I might feel a bit more put off by this, however based on what I know from the book and how the scene is presented in the trailer, it looks like this part is revealed as archive footage to show devastation the aliens made on earth years ago, as opposed to a big moment within the movie. And it's a split second compared to the rest of the big effects revealed in the trailer.
On the subject of recycling movie effects, I can't help but think of the child laughter that we sometimes hear in movies, TV shows and commercials, which always sounds the same. I actually remember it best from N64's Diddy Kong Racing open, and it's been featured in other things since. Someone actually made a BlogSpot page about that one, so I feel less alone in being irritated every time I hear it, knowing it's recycled laughter.
