Best film of the day. This is the story of the 1972 chess match between Boris Spassky and Bobby Fischer and the performance of Tobey Maguire in the lead role is superb given he likely is a foot shorter than Fischer was. The movie was focussed mostly on Fischer’s mental illness and how it affected the match so no major analysis of the games or the chess playing so if you are a chess geek this may disappoint. We follow Fischer from his youth as a child prodigy to the end of the 1972 match in which he crushes Spassky 12 ½ to 8 ½ in points and one of Spassky’s points is due to a forfeit when Fischer refused to show up for the second game. For the geeks however – look at Game 6 of the match which is arguably the greatest match ever played. When Spassky resigned he stood up and applauded Fischer’s brilliance in the game. The focus on the personalities however gives the film great dramatic energy and you will forget at the end that Maguire ever played Spiderman.

http://www.tiff.net/festivals/thefestival/programmes/galapresentations/pawn-sacrifice