Spring is almost here, and if the Olympics didn’t motivate you to get fit for summer, then maybe Rialto Documentary’s ‘Charismatic Stars in Sport’ series might do the trick. Featuring films that explore the inspirational lives of boxing legends Manny Pacquiao and Muhammad Ali, and weightlifting world champion C.T. Fletcher, the series also looks at Hollywood icons Paul Newman and Steve McQueen’s obsessions with motor racing. If you prefer your games to be of the board game variety, then check out the chess moves in Pawn Sacrifice.
Pawn Sacrifice Premieres Saturday 3rd September, 8.30pm
If you think tennis players throw epic tantrums, or rock stars make ridiculous demands on tour, then meet American chess master and world champion Bobby Fisher (Tobey Maguire). Able to out-tantrum and out-demand the best of them, Fisher is famous for his 1972 battle with Russian Boris Spassky (Liev Schreiber) in a match up that was just as much a battle between the superpowers as it was a game of chess.
Directed by Edward Zwick (The Last Samurai, Blood Diamond), Pawn Sacrifice begins by exploring Fisher’s early years. His mother was a communist who refused to tell Bobby who his father was, but encouraged his love of chess by finding him a tutor, Carmine Nigro (Conrad Pla). Fisher became the US champion in his teens, and dedicated his 20’s to becoming the World Champion. By the time he challenges the Soviet Union’s world chess champion Spassky, Fisher has become a publicly paranoid, narcissistic chess genius who spouts forth anti-Semitic propaganda – even though he’s Jewish.
The film features an impressive cast that also includes Peter Sarsgaard, but front and centre is the baby-faced Tobey Maguire as the complex and obsessive Fisher. Maguire goes some way to making this unlikable character affable, however, neither Zwick nor Maguire manage to get to the bottom of what drove Fisher to become so troubled and unreasonable, meaning Fisher remains a bit of an enigma.
The Grandmaster Premieres Monday 29th August, 8.30pm
Wrapping up a month of Asian film on Rialto World is the Oscar-nominated The Grandmaster, a beautifully shot Hong Kong – Chinese martial arts drama. The main character in director Wong Kar-Wai romantic melodrama is inspired by Ip Man, a master exponent of Wing Chun kung fu who taught Bruce Lee.
Tony Leung (who worked with Kar-Wai on In the Mood For Love) takes on the role of Ip Man, and throughout the film we flit back and forth in time as he travels from southern China’s Guangdong province in the 1930s to Hong Kong in the 1950s, dealing with the Japanese invasion in 1938 and the loss of his wife and children along the way.
The story focuses just as much on Gong Er (Zhang Ziyi), the daughter of Manchurian grandmaster Gong Yutian, who is as talented at kung fu as Ip Man. The two are clearly fascinated with each other, and their fight sequences are beautifully choreographed to appear like set pieces out of a romantic musical.
Filled with spectacular set pieces that capture not just the beauty of the choreography, but of the costumes and settings as well, The Grandmaster is a romantic martial arts film that’s as interested in the small details as it is in the overall impact of its epic visuals. The transitions between places and periods might be a touch confusing at times, but this is a classy and epic tale that will delight fans of the more poetic brand of martial arts films.
London Road Premieres Sunday 4th September, 8.30pm
London Road is the film adaptation of a successful musical directed by Rufus Norris that played in 2011 at the Cottesloe stage at London’s National Theatre. The stage show featured music by Adam Cork and dialogue and lyrics by the verbatim-theatre pioneer Alecky Blythe. The musical told the story of the 2006 Ipswich serial murders and the effect they had on the inhabitants of London Road. Blythe’s script is based on her own interviews with the locals, the media and the women who worked as prostitutes on London Road, and it makes for compelling viewing.
The film, also directed by Norris, embraces its musical origins as its actors drift between song and speech. An impressive cast, including Olivia Coleman and Tom Hardy, do a great job of portraying the tension and fear felt by the locals during the ‘Ipswich Ripper’ time. You’ll get more out of this film if you are a fan of the musical genre, but for those of you like me who would happily watch Olivia Coleman sing the phone book, there’s still plenty here to admire.