Can “you” make an exciting movie about chess?
“Brooklyn Castle”, by Katie Dellamaggiore, managed to keep
me on the edge of my Landmark seat as it traces the performance of several
middle school kids through national public school chess championships in
Dallas, Saratoga Springs, Columbus, and Minneapolis. The camera does focus on just a few
positions, including one from the same Two Knights Defense that I lost horribly
with recently on my own return to tournaments (I’ll pick that up later). The title of the film refers to the fact that a Rook (the chess piece that moves along rows or columns only) is sometimes called a "castle", and that castling is a way to protect the King in the opening.
The surface story, of course, is how the teachers, parents
and kids at I.S. 318 (Intermediate School 318) in Brooklyn (the Williamsburg
section) faces drastic budget cuts and manage to keep their “Yankees of Public
School Chess” team funded and able to travel the country, and how they even
keep the extracurricular program going. Several teachers and guidance
counselors are presented, including one buzz-cut, balding young male teacher
who also coaches the kids for their placement exams, and a young woman with a
slight Eastern European accent, who actually teaches chess after school almost
as if it were an academic course. (In undergraduate
school, we used to wonder what a major in chess would look like: freshman courses in all the groups of
openings, a year course in the middle game, courses in specific kinds of
endgames).
The young woman, when teaching chess strategy and tactics,
makes interesting observations on how decisions about chess moves parallel
issues in real life. Is that isolated
pawn (as resulting from, say, the Tarrasch Defense to the Queen’s Gambit) a
weakness or a strength? That question
parallels the modern debate on whether hyperindividualism has been carried to
far; in an “endgame”, socially isolated “people” can get plucked off easily and
a whole community can fail. The film at
least hints at that idea.
The role of the teachers as personal role models is
particularly persuasive. They attend and
chaperon the kids in the hotels on the cross-country trips (leaving for Dallas
at 3.15AM in one scene). I worked as a
substitute teacher for a while last decade (after “retirement”), and that “stumbled”,
as I have detailed elsewhere. Had I put
myself into it, given up self-publishing and become a full-time teacher, would
I have been game for this kind of interaction with kids, when I have not been
married or had kids myself?
A local church here (the First Baptist Church of the City of
Washington DC) did sponsor a DC school tournament in February 2004 (before the days of Michelle Rhee), as I recall,
holding the entire event in the basement Fellowship Hall. I did volunteer at that event as an assistant
director. To do that consistently, I
need to become a better and steadier player again myself (and I just recently
rejoined the Arlington Chess Club, as I mentioned above).
The documentary does explain the USCF (United States Chess
Federation) rating system. Generally, 1500-1800 is “club strength”. Above 2000, players have real skill. But chess is a little bit like pro
football. In any one game, anything can
happen. Upsets are common. I have beaten
a master rated 600 points higher than me (he just got careless with a sacrifice -- that was when I was in the Army in 1969)
and lost to people 600 points lower. The
character Patrick finds that out in the film.
The film also mentions the Continental Chess Association, which
sponsors many big tournaments around the country (particularly in the
Northeast). When I was active, Bill
Goichberg directed these tournaments.
The movie shows a tournament in Dallas, but doesn’t specifically
show the Dallas Chess Club, in which I was active in the 1980s, and could spin
some tall tales about. The Dallas Chess
Club used to meet in a big space in East Dallas before moving north to a more
compact space on Forest Lane. I don’t
know if it is still there.
The production company for the film is Rescued Media, and
the distributor is PDA. The official
site is here.
The USCF link is here.
The CCA link is this.
There have been a few other important films about
chess. One was Paramount’s “Searching
for Bobby Fischer” (Paramount, 1993, directed by Steven Zaillian, with Ben
Kingsley and Joe Mantegna, which I
believe, as I recall, starts with games in Washington Square Park in Greenwich
Village – the book is by Fred Waitzkin, and there’s a great line from the boy, “They’re
just pieces.” Another is AE’s “Knights
of the South Bronx” (2005, directed Allen Hughes), with Ted Danson. See also HBO's bio "Bobby Fischer Against the World", June 6, 2011.
So, can chess be like “Moneyball”? Well, maybe if some major league players also
became chess masters. (I wonder if any
of the Washington Nationals actually does play chess. It’s a good game for baseball managers and
football coaches to know. ) I think it’s
more about character than action.
For today’s short film, see “Soulfire: The Mission in Belize”
on my “drama” blog.
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