Pawn Sacrifice

Pawn Sacrifice is a 2014 American biographical drama film about chess grandmaster and 11th world champion Bobby Fischer. It follows Fischer's challenge against top Soviet chess grandmasters during the Cold War and culminating in the World Chess Championship 1972 match versus Boris Spassky in Reykjavík, Iceland. It was directed by Edward Zwick and written by Steven Knight, and stars Tobey Maguire as Fischer, Liev Schreiber as Spassky, Lily Rabe as Joan Fischer, and Peter Sarsgaard as William Lombardy. It was released in the United States on September 16, 2015. The film received generally positive reviews, with many critics praising Maguire's performance, but grossed only $5 million worldwide against a budget of $19 million. Plot In 1972, Bobby Fischer tears apart his hotel room in a paranoid delusional state, believing he is being spied upon by the Soviet KGB. Two decades earlier, in 1951 Brooklyn, Fischer's mother, a Soviet Jewish immigrant, explains to 8-year-old Bobby that the FBI has her under surveillance because she supports Marxist revolution in the U.S. She coaches Bobby on what to say to the FBI if he is ever approached.