Queen of Katwe
Wednesday, February 8, 2017 at 7:28PM
Dennis Monokroussos in chess in film

I didn't watch the movie when it was in theaters, but had a look now that it's on DVD. It's based on the story of the young Ugandan player Phiona Mutesi, who, while not a prodigy in any conventional sense (her FIDE rating is 1628), was able to perform remarkably well given an environment that didn't conduce to success in chess or any other overtly intellectual pursuit.

It's a formula movie, but a well-done entrant in the genre. Moreover, it's good publicity for chess, and not only because it presents chess players presented as human beings rather than collections of neuroses straight out of the DSM-5. (Well, Mutesi is presented that way. Her opponents tend to be a somewhat haughty lot, puffed up before the game and distraught afterward. There's probably a rule somewhere that Hollywood can only dispense with one stereotype at a time; perhaps they think audiences are so simple-minded that making everyone in a movie three-dimensional would be too confusing.)

Anyway, while it's not a must-see it's a decent movie, especially for kids and our "civilian" (i.e. non-chess-playing) friends.

Article originally appeared on The Chess Mind (http://www.thechessmind.net/).
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