Bobby Fischer

Birth : 1943-03-09, Chicago, Illinois, USA

Death : 2008-01-17

History

Robert James "Bobby" Fischer was an American chess prodigy, grandmaster, and the eleventh World Chess Champion. Many consider him the greatest chess player of all time. At age 13 Fischer won a "brilliancy" that became known as The Game of the Century. Starting at age 14, Fischer played in eight United States Championships, winning each by at least a one-point margin. At age 15, Fischer became both the youngest grandmaster up to that time and the youngest candidate for the World Championship. At age 20, Fischer won the 1963–64 U.S. Championship with 11/11, the only perfect score in the history of the tournament. Fischer's My 60 Memorable Games (1969) remains a revered work in chess literature.

Movies

Bobby Fischer Against the World
Himself (archive footage)
The first documentary feature to explore the tragic and bizarre life of the late chess master Bobby Fischer.
Me & Bobby Fischer
Bobby Fischer
In this documentary viewers get to know Sæmi Rock Palsson´s struggle for the liberation of Bobby from prison in Japan and how he managed to provide his friend Icelandic citizenship. The story of an unlikely friendship between the notorious chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer imprisoned in a Japanese jail and his Icelandic bodyguard Sæmi Rock Palsson who fought the wrath of the United States government to free his friend The phone rang in the middle of the night, waking Saemi up. “There is a collect call for you Sir; from Bobby Fischer. Will you accept it?” His friend, the former world champion of chess, the American hero, was in trouble. Bobby Fischer called “collect” from a public phone in prison in Japan. Sæmundur did not hesitate one moment – this man must be rescued. It does not matter if he has not met his friend for three decades and only heard his voice over phone just few times all this time. His friend was in trouble and Sæmi is a friend indeed.