a part I thought was inaccurate was how they were playing in the tournament with regular boards and computers.
You're right in that that doesn't happen in real life; but I think it was shown that way to accentuate the idea that these kids were walking into a situation where they were at a disadvantage because their school district could not provide the same technology so it reinforces how much adversity they faced and how against all odds it all was.
I was a tournament player myself (class C, "meh") and honestly I was not bothered at all about the technical details, it's totally not the point of the movie. The movie "Hoosiers" is preposterous to basketball aficionados but that doesn't matter, it's not the point.
Also, tipping the king over - high school players are more immature and the winner will often not be happy if the resigning player just stops the clock and goes to shake hands, the winner will want verbal confirmation that he has won. Kids will even say "check" out loud in a quiet tournament hall sometimes, they just don't know any better. Adding that would have been accurate actually, especially since most of these players are so novice many of them would need to have it pointed out that they are in check before they made their next move. Nonetheless I'm glad they did leave it quiet.
This movie hits a bit close to home for me as I played in high school myself, in the suburbs of the Chicago area, and at the state championship we faced a team exactly like this. From downtown Chicago, and the players were dressed in that same defensive style you see in the movie, and they were all black (coach was white.) There were very few other black players there. Anyway, my team happened to play them and we won but not by much. I won my game on board 5 or 6 but our top two boards got crushed, against kids very much like the talented kid in this movie. As an isolated kid in the suburbs who never really interacted with black kids before, I think this experience did something for me, I probably grew up less racist, less believing of negative stereotypes (this is the 1980's.) Their team finished pretty well, above 50%. I thought it was awesome :-)
Lovely movie, and it was refreshing that the teacher/protagonist was not cut from among the white savior genre as many of these movies about reaching minority students etc. Highly recommended.
reply
share
sithlyone
8 years ago
This movie hits a bit close to home for me as I played in high school myself, in the suburbs of the Chicago area, and at the state championship we faced a team exactly like this. From downtown Chicago, and the players were dressed in that same defensive style you see in the movie, and they were all black (coach was white.) There were very few other black players there. Anyway, my team happened to play them and we won but not by much. I won my game on board 5 or 6 but our top two boards got crushed, against kids very much like the talented kid in this movie. As an isolated kid in the suburbs who never really interacted with black kids before, I think this experience did something for me, I probably grew up less racist, less believing of negative stereotypes (this is the 1980's.) Their team finished pretty well, above 50%. I thought it was awesome :-)
Great comment. I too played in high school, but I was on the Urban schools team (The only white kid) and I never grew up thinking one school was better or worse based off of location. When we came to town we usually did very well. I was board 3 and the two kids above me were extremely good. This movie brought back a lot of memories and I really enjoyed it.
People who are so hung up on the specifics (in a chess movie? Really??) totally miss the point of the movie and probably don't enjoy much.
reply
share