Today, we’re dealing with an Estonian film, of all things. It’s based on a novel by the Strugatsky brothers of the same name, which apparently means something like The ‘dead mountaineer’ hotel.1 The story is that a policeman is sent to an isolated hotel deep in the mountains for some unspecified trouble. When he arrives there, it turns out that nobody called him and the trouble seems as real as it is specified. He decides to spend a night at the hotel, because fog in the mountains makes driving back difficult. Things start going awry soon enough, of course, but the first evening everything is still fine.
The small group of guests have dinner together with their host and then they repair to the bar. Some people dance. Some people drink. Some people play chess. Some people’s ears are pricking up.
We only get a brief glance of the board. It’s also from an odd angle, but what can you expect in an odd movie based on an odd book?2
Sadly, all that is visible of the black pieces is the vague shimmer of lights reflecting on the glossy pieces. I’m pretty sure there is something, probably a pawn, on e6 and b6, but I have not been able to determine the other pieces with any degree of certainty. For the white pieces, however, position and identity are pretty certain.
“After three moves you’ll have no bishop” black claims. If that’s true, she’ll probably win,3 but she seems perhaps a tad too drunk to be wholly believable and there’s no way to independently verify her claim. On the other hand, perhaps she just means that he’s going to get killed soon.
Realism: 4/5 What we see is pretty normal. What we don’t see we cannot judge.
Probable winner: Black, perhaps. Or white. Or nobody. Who really knows with these weird foreign movies?
1. [So, worst hotel name ever?] ↩
2. [You probably expect a link to a diagram editor here.] ↩
3. [I guess she could just mean an exchange of minor pieces, but the way she says it very much suggests otherwise.] ↩