Netflix Review: The Queen's Gambit

The Movie Buff
Nov 9, 2020
3 min read

*The Queen's Gambit is available to stream on Netflix*

I was absolutely shocked how much I enjoyed this mini-series. If you like chess, you'll love this series. If you don't like chess, this series will make you feel mentally feeble for not liking chess.

The Plot

The series opens on a 21-year-old Beth Harmon as she wakes up hungover to someone slamming on her hotel door. She opens it to find out she's overslept for the most important chess match of her career. She pops painkillers, washes it down with vodka, and walks out into flashing cameras. We then flash back to Beth Harmon as a 9-year-old sullen orphan who stumbles upon the game of chess while adjusting to her new orphanage. As the orphanage's janitor secretly teaches her, she picks it up fast, and it soon becomes all she can think about. We follow Beth as she grows up to be adopted by very typical 60's couple. The wife is miserable and the husband is distant, but now Beth is able to enter local chess tournaments. Being a woman, she is typically scoffed at and recommended to play in the women's chess league. One by one, she manages to defy expectations in fantastical chess matches. We see Beth not only grow as a chess player, but grow as a person. Her addictive personality leads her to acting on dark impulses that affect her personal life and her professional chess career.

Anya Taylor-Joy

Damn, where did she come from? She burst onto the scene with her role in Split and I feel like I have since seen her in everything. She literally carries this series on her back as Beth Harmon. I would bet money she gets an Emmy nomination for this. Her ability to display complete confidence and vulnerability at the same time is remarkable. You root for her every time she's on the screen, even when she falls victim to her addictions. Perfect casting.

The Game of Chess

Wow, I wish I was taught chess as a kid. Who knew it was so badass? You don't exactly need to understand chess to know what's going on in this series. You get the idea of when a move was bad or good based on people's reactions. Every now and then a character will lay some exposition for context if you get too lost. However, I paused the series and watched a quick overview of chess on YouTube. Turns out, I still don't know anything about chess. The idea of it is so cool to me though, and this series really makes you reconsider what you think about people who play chess. Millions of possibilities, each game is different than the last, and the strategies are so complex that I's admit that chess might be the perfect game. A true battle of the minds.

The Production Design

This series was brilliantly made. Each setting was gorgeously crafted to fit the era it was set in, and each scene was perfectly lit. The color schemes might seem dull at times, but it contrasts perfectly with each scene. Chess, on its surface, is not exciting to look at. But when the action picks up, so too do the colors.