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Films with theme "Films about chess", sorted by rating
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Pawn Sacrifice (2015)
, 1h54Directed by Edward Zwick
Origin USA
Genres Drama, Thriller, Biography
Themes Jeu, Sports films, Films about chess
Actors Lily Rabe, Liev Schreiber, Peter Sarsgaard, Tobey Maguire, Michael Stuhlbarg, Sophie Nélisse
American grandmaster Bobby Fischer (Tobey Maguire) finds himself caught between two superpowers when he challenges the Soviet Union and its greatest player, Boris Spassky (Liev Schreiber), for the 1972 World Chess Championship.
Return from the Ashes (1965)
, 1h45Directed by J. Lee Thompson
Origin United-kingdom
Genres Drama, Thriller
Themes Sports films, Films about chess
Actors Maximilian Schell, Ingrid Thulin, Samantha Eggar, Herbert Lom, Talitha Getty, Vladek Sheybal
Shortly before the Nazi invasion of France, Dr. Michele Wulf (Thulin) encounters the younger Stanislaus Pilgrin (Schell) over a game of lightning chess, not being aware that Pilgrin is a chess master. She becomes intrigued with the fortune-hunting Pilgrin and the two begin a liaison. Upon the Nazi invasion, in order to protect Michele, who is Jewish, Stan marries her, to no avail it turns out when the Gestapo arrests her and sends her to a concentration camp.
The Chess Player (1927)
, 2h15Directed by Raymond Bernard, Jean Hémard
Origin France
Genres Drama, War, Fantasy
Themes Jeu, Films about chess
Actors Pierre Blanchar, Charles Dullin, Édith Jéhanne, Camille Bert, Pierre Batcheff, Jackie Monnier
In 1776, a young Polish patriot, Boleslas Vorowski, is wounded in an abortive uprising against the Russian forces in Vilnius. A reward for his capture is offered but he is sheltered by Baron von Kempelen, an inventor of lifelike automata, who plans to smuggle Vorowski, a skilful chess-player, to Germany concealed inside a chess-playing automaton called The Turk. Major Nicolaïeff, a Russian rival of Vorowski, challenges The Turk to a game and is defeated, but he realises that the machine is being secretly operated by Vorowski. He arranges for The Turk to be sent to Moscow to entertain the Empress Catherine II. When The Turk refuses to allow Catherine to cheat, the Empress orders that the automaton is to be executed by firing squad at dawn. During a masked ball, von Kempelen replaces Vorowski inside The Turk, to enable him to escape with his lover Sophie. Nicolaïeff, who has been sent to search von Kempelen's house, is slain by the inventor's sabre-wielding automata.
Life of a King (2013)
Origin USA
Genres Drama
Themes Sports films, Films about chess
Actors Cuba Gooding Jr., Dennis Haysbert, Lisa Gay Hamilton, Paula Jai Parker, Richard T. Jones, Malcolm Mays
The film tells the true story of Eugene Brown (Cuba Gooding, Jr.), an ex-con who starts a chess club for inner-city youths in Washington, D.C..
Life of a King (2013)
, 1h40Origin USA
Genres Drama
Themes Sports films, Films about chess
Actors Cuba Gooding Jr., Dennis Haysbert, Lisa Gay Hamilton, Paula Jai Parker, Richard T. Jones, Malcolm Mays
The film tells the true story of Eugene Brown (Cuba Gooding, Jr.), an ex-convict who starts the Big Chair Chess Club for inner-city youths in Washington, D.C..
Queen to Play (2009)
, 1h36Directed by Caroline Bottaro
Origin France
Genres Drama, Comedy, Comedy-drama
Themes Jeu, Seafaring films, Sports films, Transport films, Films about chess
Actors Sandrine Bonnaire, Kevin Kline, Francis Renaud, Valérie Lagrange, Alexandra Gentil, Alice Pol
The film stars Sandrine Bonnaire as a French chambermaid on the island of Corsica. She develops an interest in chess. She has been cleaning the house of an American doctor (played by Kevin Kline in his first French-speaking role), and he begins helping her practice and improve. She must deal with her growing fascination with the game and with her husband and teenaged daughter.
Brainwashed (1960)
, 1h44Directed by Gerd Oswald
Origin German
Genres Drama
Themes Sports films, Films about chess, Political films
Actors Curd Jürgens, Hansjörg Felmy, Claire Bloom, Mario Adorf, Hans Söhnker, Albert Bessler
Chess world champion Centowic wants to travel by ship to an important chess tournament. The ship, however, starts behind schedule, because a mysterious and obviously anxious passenger, who is on his way to the port with Bishop Ambrosse, is expected.
Fahim (2019)
, 1h47Directed by Pierre-François Martin-Laval
Origin France
Genres Drama, Biography, Comedy, Comedy-drama
Themes Jeu, La provence, Films about chess
Actors Gérard Depardieu, Isabelle Nanty, Pierre-François Martin-Laval, Didier Flamand, Walid Afkir, Fahim Fazli
Le jeune Fahim est contraint de fuir son pays natal, le Bangladesh, avec son père. Ils quittent ainsi le reste de la famille pour venir à Paris. Ils vont alors subir une longue attente pour obtenir l’asile politique. En situation irrégulière, ils sont menacés d'expulsion. Fahim va faire la rencontre de Sylvain, l’un des meilleurs entraîneurs d'échecs (personnage inspiré par Xavier Parmentier). Malgré un peu de méfiance, ils vont apprendre à se connaître et deviennent amis. Fahim souhaite participer au championnat de France mais la menace d’expulsion se fait de plus en plus pressante. Le jeune garçon n’a alors plus qu’une seule solution : devenir champion de France.
The Luzhin Defence (2000)
, 1h49Directed by Marleen Gorris
Origin United-kingdom
Genres Drama, Romance
Themes Jeu, Sports films, Films about chess
Actors John Turturro, Emily Watson, Geraldine James, Stuart Wilson, Christopher Thompson, Kelly Hunter
It's the early 1920s and Aleksandr Ivanovich 'Sascha' Luzhin (Turturro), a gifted but tormented chess player, arrives in a Northern Italian city to compete in an international chess competition. Prior to the tournament he meets Natalia Katkov (Watson) and he falls in love with her almost immediately. She in turn finds his manner to be appealing and they begin to see each other in spite of her mother's disapproval.
, 1h43Directed by Wolfgang Petersen
Genres Drama
Themes Jeu, Sports films, Films about chess
Actors Bruno Ganz, Ljuba Tadić, Alexander Hegarth
A scientist, who swore off playing chess after a nervous breakdown as a boy wunderkind, creates an undefeated chess program. But the Russian world champ beats Tommy Rosemund's masterwork in a televised match. So the West German mathematician becomes a top chess pro himself, which the West German media boast will prove the superiority of Germany and democracy. The jowly, white-faced Rosemund believes that the entire Red Communist bloc is out to stop him from vanquishing their atheist pretty boy, Stefan Koruga, to become the next Bobby Fischer and a symbol that ruthless capitalism is preferable to socialism.
Jour Sa Vie (1982)
, 1h20Directed by Gilles Carle
Origin Canada
Genres Documentary
Themes Jeu, Sports films, Films about chess
Actors Fernando Arrabal
Le film décrit les personnalités et les stratégies de Bobby Fischer, Viktor Kortchnoï, Anatoli Karpov et d'autres champions d'échecs.
Knights of the South Bronx (2005)
, 1h30Directed by Albert et Allen Hughes
Origin USA
Genres Drama
Themes Sports films, Films about chess
Actors Ted Danson, Malcolm David Kelley, Keke Palmer, Clifton Powell, Devon Bostick, Kate Vernon
The movie is based on the true story of David MacEnulty who taught schoolchildren of the Bronx Community Elementary School 70 to play at competition level, eventually winning New York City and the New York State Chess Championships. The screenplay portrays whistle-blowing and a mid-life crisis that combine to remove Richard Mason (played by Ted Danson) from his old life. He becomes a substitute teacher and is assigned to a fourth-grade class in a South Bronx school. In the class are students with parents who are drug addicts or in jail or just scrambling to pay the bills. Few of them see a purpose in school other than meeting society's requirements, and he struggles, mostly in vain, to reach them.
, 1h30Genres Documentary
Themes Sports films, Films about chess
Kasparov had beaten Deep Blue, a computer designed specifically to beat him, in a match played in 1996. He agreed to offer a rematch the following year. Kasparov won the first game of the rematch easily with the white pieces. In the second game, Kasparov was struggling with the black pieces, but set a trap that most computers fall for. Deep Blue didn't fall for it and won to level the match. At the time it was reported that both Kasparov and Deep Blue missed a perpetual check that could have given Kasparov a draw, but today strongest computer chess engines, for example Stockfish, which are stronger than every human, don't consider the final position as draw, but as having better winning chances for white, contradicting the human analysis at the time that Deep Blue missed a perpetual check. The next three matches ended in draws, with Kasparov appearing to weaken psychologically. Deep Blue went on to win the decisive sixth game, marking the first time in history that a computer defeated the World Champion in a match of several games.
Dangerous Moves (1984)
, 1h50Directed by Richard Dembo
Origin France
Genres Drama, Thriller
Themes Jeu, Sports films, Films about chess, Political films
Actors Michel Piccoli, Liv Ullmann, Alexandre Arbatt, Leslie Caron, Wojciech Pszoniak, Jean-Hugues Anglade
Pavius Fromm est un jeune génie des échecs, impétueux et provocateur. Lituanien, il a fui son pays et la mainmise soviétique, et réside en Occident. Pour la finale du championnat du monde d'échecs en Suisse, il doit affronter un compatriote bien plus âgé, Liebskind, qui a, lui, le soutien du régime.
The Chess Player (1938)
, 1h30Directed by Jean Dréville, Jacques Vitry
Origin France
Genres Drama, Historical
Themes Jeu, Films about chess
Actors Françoise Rosay, Conrad Veidt, Micheline Francey, Gaston Modot, Jacques Grétillat, Bernard Lancret
Un jeune patriote polonais nommé Boleslas, dont la tête est mise à prix, tente de s'enfuir des frontières russes, dissimulé dans un des automates du baron de Kempelen. Un agent de Catherine II de Russie, qui a compris le subterfuge, achète l'automate pour le livrer à l'impératrice. Celui-ci sera amené à se trahir au cours d'une partie d'échecs.