Mad for 'Queen's Gambit'

Given that I learned how to play chess from a Mad Magazine in the early 1960s — an endless source of amusement and marvel to my parents, including my chess-playing father — you might guess I'd initially be more curious about the seven-part Netflix dramatic series "The Queen's Gambit." When Ann suggested watching it, I was in the middle of several other obligations and assumed it was a spinoff of "The Crown," which I've enjoyed through three seasons.

Yeah, I know. Your move.

But when two friends who agree on nothing else heartily recommended the series, I decided to give it a try, however reluctantly. After all, chess is a little like baseball — thrilling enough in an edge-of-your-seat sort of way for the players involved but slower than the more popular hard-contact sports most U.S. spectators crave.

Verdict: Terrific. This Cold War tale set in the 1960s about an orphaned American youngster who discovers a real talent for chess and becomes an international competitor in a sport largely the domain of boys and men is a winner for three very different reasons:

First, though the series is quite leisurely paced — the fictional plot draws some from the life of late chess champion Bobby Fischer — the characterizations are always vivid and compelling, not just that of Beth Harmon as she battles private demons and addictions along the way but also among the wide range of rag-tag competitors with whom she competes for cash and confidence.

Second, series director Scott Frank, chief photographer Steven Meizler and film editor Michelle Tesoro absolutely love actress Anya Taylor-Joy's eyes and facial contours, especially when she's sitting across from a chess opponent, formidable or not. The actress has in the past dismissed any notion she's conventionally beautiful, yet she is strikingly breathtaking in this series and the filmmakers savor her features through everything from framing hairstyles to highly effective use of lighting and shadows.

Third, this movie is rare in a society that too readily dismisses science, math and expertise in favor of reality-TV figures, professional athletes, grandstanding politicians and movie stars: Not only does it focus on Beth Harmon and her friends and supporters, most also chess competitors, it also doesn't reduce any of them to the usual insulting stereotypes. It lends them great diversity in personality and dreams and weaknesses and hopes. It actually celebrates people who use their minds, portraying them with a depth and charm and individuality seldom evidenced in our times and the popular arts.

Beyond that — well, dig those crazy ceilings in Beth Harmon's chess-obsessed mind. And rejoice at the uplifting finale set in a Russian park full of old men playing chess, one of whom looks especially familiar.

"The Queen's Gambit" has reportedly spurred an interest in chess, hardly surprising in pandemic times but encouraging in an age of misinformation-peddling and intellectual laziness abroad in our land. Let's hope, at least in some small way, it prompts a greater respect for those who employ fertile minds and intellect in addressing and solving our societal and political problems rather than forever creating or complicating them.