I can’t quite decide if “Computer Chess” is a brilliant bad movie or just a bad bad movie. It derives from the mumblecore movement of awkward dialogue, minimal story and consequence, ugly analog video cinematography and the “real kind” of naturalistic acting.
Some fascinating films have been made of these stripped parts, and Andrew Bujalski’s is one of them. “Computer Chess” is a movie that through diligent attention to detail immerses the viewer in another reality. It fools the viewer into believing this is a documentary and demonstrates remarkable craft in doing so. But whether or not this beguiling film is actually a reality worth delving into is another question altogether.
“Computer Chess” is the story of a group of programmers in the early 1980s who have gathered at a drab Midwest motel to test their chess software and see which is best. The winning team even gets the opportunity to play the master of ceremonies (film critic Gerald Peary) and see if for the first time a computer can best a human at a game of chess.
Bujalski transports us to a world complete with bulky computers the size of a wine fridge and haircuts from another time. He pulls back the camera and reveals a sea of pocket-protected shirts, thick rimmed glasses and ugly named tags. The black and white cinematography is not merely grainy and ugly; it’s downright amateurish as though the man hired to document this piddly occasion was learning for the first time.
All of this is intentional of course, and the distracting lower thirds on the screen or the docu-realistic style only add to the sensation. One of the film’s early best scenes is a panel discussion that captures the stilted jargon and bland competition and tension between these people perfectly. The actors glare underneath their glasses and talk with exaggerated hand gestures, even making the subtlest and most awkward of advances on the one woman in attendance.
Back in their hotel rooms, some onlookers discuss their apocalyptic fear that the machines will take over the world, and it’ll all start here when the first computer beats the first human at chess. “War is death, Hell is pain, but chess is victory,” one man says in his pseudo-intellectual conversation about morality, technology and war.
The film gets itself trapped in loops of logic and paradoxes about technology, although this too is all by design. Bujalski shows a scene in which a man takes a knight and proceeds to jump around the entire 8×8 chess board as they discuss their circuital ideas.
Before long Bujalski is turning this film pastiche on its head by introducing a strange cult of swingers sharing the same motel. One couple coddles one of the younger nerds about the fear of missing out on his potential, and the film again calls attention to this dichotomy of big ideas and minimal stakes.
“Computer Chess” is so smartly self-aware about its own conditions that it is never uninteresting, but Bujalski muddles the tone of what could be a scathing period satire or a fully surreal experiment.
I’ve seen the film described as a comedy, but the muted tones suggest a film trying to resist pastiche. On the other hand, the twisted conclusion and sci-fi revelations show a film that wants to be something so much more, but Bujalski is too invested in the minute details of the period setting to leave enough breadcrumbs about the surreal twist.
Frankly, “Computer Chess” is a frustrating indie achievement. It’s captivating and strange and well made in its intentionally bad way, but it ultimately gets itself trapped in a stalemate.
2 stars
1 thought on “Computer Chess”