Computer Chess (**1/2)

I like low-budget films that make a virtue of necessity, and this one does that. Setting his story almost entirely in a middle-budget hotel, Andrew Bujalski follows a group of computer programmers pitting their skills against each other in a machine-on-machine tournament. Also, it’s 1982, 15 years before IBM’s Deep Blue would defeat champion Garry Kasparov in a match, and around the same length of time before geek was used as a compliment. The lone female programmer is a novelty.

Bujalski used old video equipment to make the film in black and white and even includes what look like technical glitches. It somewhat resembles an old shot-on-video documentary, though without actual interview segments and with brief flashbacks and other things a documentary wouldn’t have. So, it’s a pretty clever film that vividly recalls the pre-Internet era of technology. Ostensibly, it’s a comedy, but it wasn’t funny enough that I heard laughter in the audience I saw it with. About the most chuckle-producing incident is a college kid’s awkward encounter with a middle-aged couple attending some kind of New Age-y spiritual retreat being held simultaneously with the tournament. When the wife says that the 64 squares on a chess board is so limiting, he points out that, actually, the number of possible plays it allows is more than 10 to the 120th power.

The college kid is perhaps the most prominent character, along with an older programmer who hasn’t reserved a room and spends his evenings trying to find somewhere to sleep. However, no character is on screen more than 25 minutes or so. (It’s doubtful you’ll recognize any of the actors either, which further helps this seem like an old film that someone found.) The movie is so faithful to its premise that in fact it seems only about as interesting as it would have been were it truly a 30-year-old documentary from an old convention. It’s of little consequence who wins the tournament and there are no other major storylines. So, while the movie was original, it left me wanting a little more.

IMDb link

viewed 7/31/13 7:15 pm at Ritz Bourse and reviewed 7/31/13