La diagonale du fou

Hey, I'm sure there's a way to make chess somewhat exciting in a movie, but this approach ain't it.

Dangerous Moves won an Oscar for best foreign film and has an impressive cast, but it was strangely kind of a bore to watch; even enough to feel like it was a bit of a challenge to finish. There's two people who are rivals and they play chess and there are good actors and they are kind of wasted. That's all there is and now I'm sleepy.

I guess there's a level of basic competency on offer in Dangerous Moves, but that's not enough to make it good, or even passable. It's more of a Dangerous Snooze, really.

Two masters of chess duel each other not only in their game but also in their different ideologies. The veteran Akiva is a Soviet Jew and ferocious Communist, master of his game but also dealing with a declining health while the young and restless genius Pavius has defected to the West to escape from the Communist tentacles.

I love that this is billed as the "thinking man's Rocky". First, this assumes that "Rocky" is not for thinking men, which is not necessarily true. It may not be high art, but it's still a good movie. But that aside, I find it interesting to compare a film about a boxer with one about chess players.

Anyway, whether we accept that marketing or not, it really is a good film. I'm curious about how accurate the subtitles are (they notoriously changed "eight" to "ten" in an early scene) but even if the film was silent, it is quite visually appealing.

"La Diagonale Du Fou" is notable as one of the only two Swiss films to ever take home the Academy Award for "Best Foreign Language Film". It is also notable as being one of only a handful of films about chess which, apparently, is not considered the most cinematic "sport", although with the right director it can be. Richard Dembo may not have been that director: his film is perfectly watchable, but not as exciting as it should / could have been. Unsurprisingly, the brightest moments involve the actual chess games; most of the other stuff (the wise old pro and the rebellious young upstart, the neglected wives, the Cold War tensions, etc.) we have seen before, in different surroundings. The little-known Alexandre Arbatt holds his own against the well-known Michel Piccoli; Leslie Caron receives third billing but is largely wasted; Liv Ullmann fares a little better. **1/2 out of 4.

Geneva welcomes the 23rd world chess championship, which sees the confrontation of the Soviet citizen Michel Piccoli, unconquered for 12 years, with his young fellow countryman, now a refugee in the West, Alexandre Arbatt, winner (conqueror) of the " tournament of the candidates "... The chess is only an excuse for a political tussle, the real game taking place gently in the wings in an East-West confrontation. The whole thing is perhaps a little dated.

Or not?"La diagonale du fou " was extremely well received at the time of issue -it won the prestigious "prix Louis Delluc" and AA- . With hindsight,it's now difficult to understand what the enthusiasm was all about.Heavily symbolic,the movie had high pretensions :the cold war on a chessboard.I must admit that for someone like me who cannot play chess at all,it's pretty tedious.But the biggest bomb is the female parts:what's the point of casting two legendary actresses (Leslie Caron,star of Minelli's musicals " an American in Paris" and "Gigi"and Walters' "Lili",and Bergmanian Liv Ullmann) and giving the first one barely five or six lines ,and the Swedish thespian a fifteen-minute walk -on part?