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I'm very curious whether someone attended the premiere and afterparty. Anyone have an event report?
Hi. I did not attend the premiere or the after-party, but did watch the film earlier today on the second viewing of the film festival. I enjoyed it. Naturally it wasn't so chess-heavy so that a broader audience could follow and enjoy the film. Most of the audience in the nearly-packed Ryerson Theatre seemed to be avid tiff / movie fans as opposed to chess fans, or at least judging by the questions posed to the director after the show. Tobey Maguire who I personally could never imagine playing Fischer delivered quite an impressive performance, as did Liev Schreiber who made you feel like you were watching the Spassky of then. Fischer's increasing paranoia through-out the movie was also quite intense on screen. The chess-fanatic-friends I watched it with were critical of some aspects but had overall positive reviews. One of my friends gave it "a solid B minus" review and one other pointed out a series of historical inaccuracies, a couple of them totally unnecessary but many others justifiable for a Hollywood film.
Re: New film about American chess star Bobby Fischer
I was at the premiere, but did not attend the after party. I enjoyed the film and would give it 7 out of 10. Very good performances by Tobey Macguire and Liev Schreiber. The games they showed were accurate, except they had Fischer resigning in game 1 after B x h2, g3, as if that was the move he missed. The game ended many moves later and Fischer still had some drawing chances. Game 6 they claimed was the greatest chess game in history, which although a great game, I don't think anyone rates it as number one. They even had Spassky applauding Fischer after the game, which I don't remember him doing. They did make a lot of the same facial expressions that I remember from the match. Also they had Fischer wearing the visor in his hotel room in Reykjavik that he wore on the cover of Sports Illustrated.
Although, they portrayed Fischer as slightly paranoid and a little crazy, I thought the movie sympathized with Fischer and hence the title of the movie. The movie was only 114 minutes long, so naturally a lot of detail could not be included. The audience seemed to love the movie. I did see a few chess players in the lobby after the movie. My wife talked to Garth Drabinsky, sitting a few seats away from us before the movie. He revealed he entered a chess tournament when he was 14 and was terrified. It was shown at Roy Thompson Hall and I would say it was 3/4 full.
Re: New film about American chess star Bobby Fischer
There was some nice stuff in the film, and it was great to see chess as a topic. They messed up one idea, replacing the 1963 Curacao Candidates event with the 1962 Varna Olympiad - a completely different kind of competition for the point they were making. Overall, I thought the film was stupid, just a long elaboration on the idea that you have to be nuts to be world chess champion. "The Dark Horse", also shown at TIFF, was far better. It is a powerful film which shows how the chess player deals with mental illness, stays positive, and uses chess to make a contribution to his life and the lives of the children he teaches.
I missed a 3rd film at TIFF which has some chess content: "Imitation Game" won the People's Choice award. It has the character of IM C.H.O'D. (Hugh) Alexander in his job as code breaker.
Re: New film about American chess star Bobby Fischer
New Film about American Chess Star Bobby Fischer
September 7, 2015
At Gardiner Chess, the Australian site, there is an article on the reaction of chessplayers to the screening of the movie Pawn Sacrifice, this past Thursday in St. Louis.
The main comments are from Garry Kasparov, Ian Rogers and Yasser Seirawan.
The movie is contrasted with Shine, the 1996 Australian biographical drama film based on the life of pianist David Helfgott, who suffered a mental breakdown and spent years in institutions.
A couple of interesting quotes from Richard Brody’s piece:
in a report in Life written soon after the Reykjavik match, Fischer was described was wearing a “natty, dollar-green slubbed-silk suit” and was depicted in a wide range of leisure activities, including being fitted for a suit by his English tailor, playing ping-pong, nuzzling a horse, dining at the home of his bodyguard, and going boating while wrapped to his neck in a blanket. Even if some of these activities were staged for the magazine’s photographers, the very fact of Fischer’s coöperation makes for a picturesque round of activities. (The reporter, Brad Darrach, claimed to have “been seeing Fischer frequently, at times daily, for almost a year and a half,” which seems like a story in itself.
_______
Fischer’s idiosyncrasy—his literally singular mixture of traits—also entails his greatness. The world’s best chess player is, at the very least, unique in his or her superiority, and that fact alone redeems the champion’s possible unfitness for other activities. The real subject of “Pawn Sacrifice” isn’t even Fischer or chess itself but nerdiness, a specialty that renders its expert less fit or apt to take part in a wide range of social activities and more apt to bring them into connection with only a band of like-minded devotees.
That’s as much of a problem for, say, religious scholars with a sinecure as it is for movie buffs focussing on technical or historical matters, for scholars of literature who look closely at the technical aspects of language rather than the substance of stories, or ideologues of all stripes. More or less any pursuit can be reduced to nerd-inspiring abstractions. Some, such as math and music, have little else, but they’re de-nerded by the essential world-changing power of math in science and engineering, and by the theatrical drama and public performance of music. (The great story of the musical nerd-genius—who, of course, withdrew from the public stage—is that of Glenn Gould.)
______
Though “Pawn Sacrifice” offers little that’s new on the subject of genius, and shrinks much of the mysterious wonder of Fischer’s character, it also stands back and merely marvels at his singular trajectory, withholding judgment along with comprehension. It’s this very awestruck modesty that redeems the movie’s banality and, inviting wide-ranging speculation and invoking free-flowing wonder, sparks a surprising delight.
Re: New film about American chess star Bobby Fischer
Another good read! Thanks, Wayne.
"We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office." - Aesop
"Only the dead have seen the end of war." - Plato
"If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing; and from robbing he comes next to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination." - Thomas De Quincey
He concludes by saying: One suspects the paranoia and personal flaws would have tripped up Fischer in today’s Internet world, long before he became champion. After Fischer won the title, he simply stopped playing competitive chess, and his mental illness became much worse. Though no one can condone Fischer’s virulent rants and dark thoughts from later years (he died in 2008), it is a bit sad to realize that someone of such towering creativity and genius, who inspired so many people through his chess, might have had his career ended at a much earlier stage today. We live in a different world.
Soviet players didn’t want to cheat, they were ordered to: Viswanathan Anand
Viswanathan Anand talks to Shivani Naik about the dividing line between Cold War and post-Cold War chess, the perception of Indian players during that period and the genius of Bobby Fischer and his iconic 1972 World Championship match with Boris Spassky.
September 28, 2015
The setting of the movie Pawn Sacrifice is during the Cold War. What do you recall of chess in Cold War times?
Well I caught the fag end of it, I mean, I was three years old when this match was played. So I grew up reading about the match but I did not experience it. One thing that struck me was simply that for many, many years if I would mention that I played chess then everyone would say, ‘aah I used to play chess during the Fischer-Spassky match.’ So I knew amongst a certain generation it had an unbelievable impact but only heard of it second hand. So a lot of the stuff in the movie was stuff that I heard, read literally about chess history.
I started playing in 1984 in world sub junior, world junior and I started to meet some of these players from the East Bloc and I heard stories and things like that, so I don’t think I copped the worst of it. By that time we were one year away from Gorbachev and things were already changing very fast. But I had some sense of what it meant, you know the kind of paranoia, you hear all these stories about spies and everybody flatters themselves into thinking that the KGB was watching them.
Fischer storms out in the film alleging that Russians are ganging up against him, there’s 5-against-1. Did you ever face that?
No, I didn’t. One of the funny things was in December January 1991-92, I played in a tournament in Italy. I was the only non-Soviet participant there and rest of the nine were all from the Soviet Union. And I won that tournament. Except by the time that tournament finished, the Soviet Union had ceased to exist. It had dissolved, and Russia had become Russia and the Republics had gone their own way. I like the joke that I was the last Soviet-era champion!
But the very fact that they didn’t gang up in any way to try stop me means that by this time, this was the new generation, which had a different way of operating. And it’s not like the earlier Soviets wanted to cheat. It was clear that they were ordered to cheat, ordered to gang up and that was it. The carrot was always you do what we tell you, we’ll let you travel. That was the kind of arrangement.
Was it strategy, like the Chinese in badminton?
That I’m not aware of enough. But basic idea was in chess because you can take a draw they would fix the draws between themselves and give themselves an extra rest day. And against Fischer, they would all work twice as hard. In effect, though it’s not a team sport, it had the feeling of resembling one. At least on the Soviet side, not on Fischer’s side.
Why did Fischer’s outspokenness stand out?
No, the thing about Fischer is he had this ‘emperor has no clothes’ kind of way of just saying the truth as he saw it. And this is why he was different from other chess players. He didn’t mince words. The others had learnt, you know, if we can’t prove it, we shouldn’t allege it. They had a sort of upper class correctness, and politically correct ways. It was like we cannot accuse the Russians unless we have definitive proof. Fischer was much more innocent in that way, in the sense that if he saw something he would say it. He accused the Russians and there was a lot of fuss kicked up by all that. But Fischer just said it like he saw it and that was it. And it turned out to be true!
I think all chess players, even the Russians liked him a lot. This is what Spassky also said many times that Bobby never realised how many fans he had in Russia. They simply liked him and they were flattered that an American was playing their sport and they knew some of the things he said might be true.
There’s a way in which Fischer describes the game in the film – personifying it. Would you rather that chess writing gets more descriptive?
That’s how we speak to each other – it’s only when a chess player communicates with the outside world that he changes the description, talks technical. When chess players talk to each other they often say… Oh! my king is running, your bishop did this, your bishop was staring at me! I mean, when we talk, we very often talk like this. It’s interesting and shows that the director had done his research. And it’s very much the way I imagine that Bobby would’ve described it or his contemporaries would’ve described chess as well. You will talk about your pieces as if they are people, as if they have become personalities almost.
Fischer in one scene, roars: “Money is respect.” How is money seen in chess?
He was completely right, of course. I mean money is respect. You can just open your eyes and look around and that is what you’ll observe. I mean we’re not allowed to say these things. But if you remember the Olympic movement, for many years they would pretend they were noble amateurs and professionals were somehow “grubby”. Except, in the end we know how that went.
And the thing is that the kind of dedication you need to pursue a sport at its highest level means you have to be a professional. And if you are a professional, you would like to retire well, you’d like to earn enough money to have a comfortable life. Bobby simply stated something that was obvious to him. And this may have been even more the case in America because it is a highly capitalist society. Having said that, Bobby made chess a professional sport. Before 1972, I think World Championship matches almost had no prize funds because it was played between two Russians, so seen as internal matches. There was no need to give them a prize fund because the state was anyway giving them a flat and giving them travel and things like that.
But Fischer needed the money. Maybe it’s an interesting point the director has picked up on, that it is not so much the money which attracts attention it is the fact that you ask for it. In the US and in most countries, a sportsman who kicks up fuss attracts attention. Like what Phineas Barnum said, there is no such thing as bad publicity. You draw attention to yourself and you become more marketable and Fischer either intuitively or some other way, grasped this. But he was just a dream personality, and you were guaranteed a controversy which means reporters who didn’t understand anything about chess could still write about the game. And he attracted attention, which is why he became a star.
There’s a moment in the movie that Lombardy (Fischer’s second) says, ‘Chess takes you very close to the edge.’ Is that something you have ever seen in a chess player?
Yes. Well, quite simply yes. I mean given the intensity of the effort involved and fact that it’s all in your head.
How was your experience meeting Fischer?
I don’t know. I tried to go there without any expectations and I enjoyed it. I enjoyed meeting him and knowing that one day I could tell people I have met him. It’s not the sort of opportunity you turn down. But as with these things, it turned out to be in a way anticlimax. Because you go, and there’s no way you can help wondering what the meeting is going to be like. And in the end you talk for a couple of hours and it’s over, and that’s it. I was happy to have met him. I could see some glimpses of the old Fischer but essentially he was an old man who was quite ill, and had been through a lot of trouble in life. And he was already well into the tragic phase of his life.
There’s interesting scene in the movie about Fischer seeking out Russian literature on chess. In pre-internet days, how did you access Russian chess literature?
I would go to Soviet chess centre in Chennai and they would give us sets and some books. But books in chess back then were if somebody managed to travel abroad and had a relative who maybe was able to buy a book somewhere. It’s hard to imagine this in a day when you just go to Amazon can click on anything. Once upon a time, it wasn’t ‘where’ you got the book but ‘if’ you got the book! I can say I’ve been on both sides of it.
What do you make of Fischer’s support cast in the film?
Fischer was the kind of genius that needed somebody to care for him in the same way that, let’s say, Newton needed someone and lot of geniuses have also needed that strong person in their life that guides them. Now, for Fischer it was Lombardy. But it was also Ed Edmondson, whose character is played by the lawyer. I’m not sure why his name’s changed in the film, but I couldn’t see anyone else who could’ve been depicted that way. Edmondson’s job consisted basically of getting Fischer to the table and they portray him quite sympathetically. Just how frustrating it is to deal with him. But he knew a lot about chess. They’ve tweaked the character slightly and I don’t know why because Edmondson knew something about chess, he was something with the chess federation, so he wouldn’t have been as bad as this lawyer was. Having said that, the character they came up with was enjoyable.
If there was a movie made on your career, which World Championship, would you choose?
I guess I could go for the Veselin Topalov one because of the volcano (Eyjafjallajökull) and the thing that you could get a little extra drama there!
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