David Fincher's next move is to take Tobey Magurie as a PAWN SACRIFICE?

Variety report that David Fincher is likely to helm Pawn Sacrifice at Columbia Pictures, the "chess" drama that should star producer Tobey Maguire as the eccentric Bobby Fischer, the only American ever to win the World Championship. Specifically, Steve Knight's (Eastern Promises) script re-tells the fascinating true account of Fischer's against-the-odds victory over long time Russian champ Boris Spassky in the 1972 World Title bout. It took place at the peak of Cold War paranoia in what was deemed as a battle between the two nations; The U.S.A and Russia. The media dubbed it "The Match of the Century". All political agendas for a brief period came down to the tactical maneuvers of 32 chess pieces on a board and two guys trying to pull checkmate on each other, which of course alluded to war strategies between two generals, two nations, etc.

The trade reports that Knight's script & Maguire's attachment had a lot of A-list directors interested with Fincher winning the nod because he has impressed Columbia with his upcoming The Social Network - a movie about the founding fathers of Facebook, released Oct 1st. Fincher now has the unenvious task of making chess look interesting on film, surely one of the least cinematic sports out there; however it's the political and psychological intrigue of the famous match that is the interesting point here. Similar to Ron Howard's Frost/Nixon, the movie will only focus on the famous televised event and won't delve into Fischer's latter day seclusion and oddity, where he renounced his U.S. citizenships, regularly made anti-semitic remarks and applauded the 9/11 attacks on America. Pawn Sacrifice is expected to be Fincher's next movie and not an English language remake of The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo with Carey Mulligan top of the wishlist to lead from a Steve Zaillian (American Gangster, Schlinder's List) script as rumored over the weekend.