Review of Searching for Bobby Fischer (1993) by John K — 12 Jul 2008

Amazing cast. Amazing movie. When I first saw this Fishburne and Kingsley weren't even on the radar (I had no idea who they were at the time) and still thought this movie was incredibly moving. In other words, even without an a-list cast this film captivates...or shall we say "checkmates" (okay, lame word usage haha:).

The script to this was profound. Two of the best scenes (and often-ovlerlooked) scenes (in addition to, obviously, the final chess match) were at the way opening when Fishburne's character first made an appearance and offered Waitzin the baseball in exchange for the knight piece. The fact that it was unspoken made it all the more powerful. A GREAT introduction to fishburne's character, too. Additionally, it was a great kind of "awareness piece" juxtaposed to the father trying to get his son to oil is clothe, so it said a lot about our inner truths our intrinsic interests and the necessity of following those. If you have an interest in something (like chess) and a parent encourages you to work on "other" or generic strengths (baseball) byu all means pursue that one passion. that's what interpretted from that single scene. Great stuff.

Seconldly, was kingsley. The one scene after he flicked the pieces off the chess board to "help him see the mating combo" better was very powerful and illuminating, but then the way he drew the piece of paper out of his satchel with such seriousnessness and delicacy, that was brilliant, because it made the grandmaster level and acrrediation sacred.

Finally, the antagonist was so brilliantly cast. This angry, haughty kid playing against waitzin. Great stuff. Additionally, after watching this the second time (possibly 3rod or 4th actually) I hadn't realized the significance of Pandolfini and had actually read some of his material before knowing it was kingsley whom played his character in this film.

It's difficult to think of two more SERIOUS and committed and potent (with the exception of daniel day-lewis of coursE) actors than fishburne and Kingsley, so having them both operate as opposing mentors for the kid made this a killer "mentor-protege" movie. Anyways, there isn't that much of a "chess film" genre in hollywood, but if one such category of film did exist, this film would most assuredly set the highest standard.