Dangerous Moves (1984)
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Dangerous Moves Movie Review
Dangerous Moves is a 1984 French Swiss film directed by Richard Dembo. It is one of the dullest Oscar winners in the category of foreign films.
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“I taste the sweet victories and I taste the bitter defeats“
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The film follows two very different men who compete in the final match of the World Chess Championship. One is younger and the other is older. The older man is getting closer to his death and there you have the conflict for the young man whether or not he should play him and win.
On the paper, it does sound intriguing, but in execution, it is absolutely mediocre. That is because the film is incredibly boring as it bored me to death almost from the very first scene. Nothing ever happens here, interesting or eventful. The film is as boring as a film about chess could be as it’s paced so badly and particularly lacking in the energy department.
I did like the conflict near the end, but it was introduced too late in the game and the film mostly doesn’t develop either of its two characters properly at all. They remain these underutilized, mysterious entities and that’s a big problem as the film demanded very strong characterization having in mind that it entirely hinges upon its two only characters basically as the others are unimportant.
Dangerous Moves is also weakly directed by Richard Dembo and particularly uninspired in terms of writing, although solid in dialogue. It is also weakly shot and the film felt very dated not only in its soft pace and awful structure of basically one match after one conversation repeated throughout, but it’s also dated in its emphasis on Russian communism.
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Dangerous Moves received an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film and basically is the second ‘Begin the Beguine’. By that I mean that it’s another extremely boring and inherently forgettable and unimportant movie that the Academy somehow found relevant enough to honor. Their choices during the eighties truly were questionable at best.
Dangerous Moves has good dialogue and some interesting scenes, but for the most part it’s an immensely boring, uneventful film that lacks energy, conviction and strong characterization. It is as boring as a movie about chess can possibly be leading to another forgettable, questionable foreign Oscar winner.
