'Computer Chess' A Review

Computer Chess is a mocumentary about a computer chess tournament in the early 80's. The film is black and white and seemingly shot on a period video camera or digitally altered to reflect the poor video quality of that era. At first this affectation creates a nostalgic authentic feel but as the film progresses shot after shot is out of focus or has resolution so poor it's difficult to discern what is happening, It becomes incredibly distracting and detracting.

The performances range from realistic to contrived to surreal. The story flows without much structure loosely following the tournament as it progresses and focuses more time on the particular programmers participating.

Tonally the film is a little unclear. It's a comedy certainly but one that maybe asks us to take it too seriously or doesn't make it clear how funny we should think it is. The ideas of technological progress and artificial intelligence are discussed through out but with almost no weight. There are a couple of hard right turns into the absurd which are enjoyable but don't necessarily jibe with the over all arc of the film.

An engaging odd watch, which left a little too much up to interpretation.

Rent It.