10 Interesting Stories From The World Of Chess

In Sherlock Holmes : A Game of Shadows, during the climactic confrontation with Professor James Moriarty, the two men play a game of chess. While the entirety of the game is not shown on camera, the endgame is partially seen and then described as the pair stop moving the pieces and instead just call out their proposed moves to one another.

There are several actions on the board that reflect what is happening in the plot. Sherlock sacrifices his Queen and Moriarty points out that he has just lost his most valuable piece. Holmes counters that sometimes a sacrifice has to be made to win overall and the end result of the game is Moriarty losing via checkmate. Sherlock Holmes ends up sacrificing himself (the most valuable piece) in order to foil Moriarty's plot.

The game they play out, at least what we are shown of it, is very reminiscent of a match between Bent Larsen and Tigran Petrosian played in 1966. The moves called out are all legal, reasonably sensible and do indeed result in a fairly nasty discovered checkmate along the H file.

When compared to how a lot of movies represent chess, this big-budget film uses it extremely well - and accurately.