Review of Luzhin Defence, The

Introduction

The Luzhin Defence is a film about chess. Now before you all yawn and turn over, don`t :) - it isn`t just about chess!

The film is based on a novel by Vladimir Nabokov and follows the same darkly ironic plot of the original, excellent book.

John Turturro gives what I believe to be his best performance to date (even better than he was in The Big Lebowski), as a Russian chess grand master who travels to Italy to compete in the match of his life and stumbles into love with a noble`s daughter (Emily Watson) - much to her mother`s distain.

Exploited by his teacher, he descends into madness with chess his only refuge from the real world.

Video

This is a very recent movie and as such the quality of the transfer is excellent.

We get an anamorphic widescreen picture with no trace of digital artefacts, no jaggies and no horrid, muddy blacks so typical of the first generation of DVD movies.

The locations (Hungary and Italy) are superbly shot and there is a wonderful attention to detail throughout, from the garden chess set through to the atmosphere of the chess matches. There is a hint of graininess in places however I suspect that was deliberate as it adds to the period feel to the production as a whole.

Even the DVD menu gets the period treatment and it blends nicely into the whole atmosphere of the feature.

Audio

The 5.1 Dolby Digital soundtrack is used to great effect, nicely demonstrating that you don`t need big explosions and action sequences to justify those extra channels.

There`s very little for the LFE track to do, but the surround channels are alive with birdsong in the gardens, murmurings during the chess games in the competition and really add to the feel of the film. Even now I can hear the ticking of those chess clocks in the back of my mind......

The centre channel is well defined and all speech comes across clearly.

A simple but effective score by Alexandre Desplat accompanies the feature.

Features

Nothing exciting, there`s a fearurette and a trailer which I guess you`d watch once.

Conclusion

I never knew chess could be so exciting!

The film gripped me from the start to the tortured climax. There are some occasions where too much of the book and not enough of the filmmakers art is evident but this doesn’t detract from what is a superb, haunting movie.

The acting is superb, the cinematography excellent and the storyline gripping. Highly recommended, even if you hate chess!