Queen Of Chess Movie Review (2026)
An upbeat documentary about trailblazing chess champion Judit Polgár, Queen Of Chess blends vibey music, rich archival footage, and an engaging look at the strategy behind her game.
While Netflix is an excellent resource for watching films and shows, its own productions can be hit or miss. There are some excellent documentaries like Selena y Los Dinos: A Family Legacy, but you also get the shoddy ones like The Investigation Of Lucy Letby. You just have to try them and find out, like Harry Potter Bertie Bott’s Every Flavour Beans.
Queen of Chess is about the rise and early career of Hungarian grandmaster Judit Polgár, the youngest woman to ever achieve grandmaster status at only 15 years and 4 months. This film discusses how her father raised her and her two sisters to become exceptional chess players, her early games, her rise to notoriety, her personal life, and her ongoing attempts to beat Russian grandmaster and champion Garry Kasparov.
This is a well-paced, engaging documentary. Judit narrates some of her story as an adult, along with various other chess professionals, her parents, her husband, and Garry Kasparov.
There is a ton of footage shown of Judit throughout her early career, and it is like a peek into the window of this growing young woman. She is confident, but slightly timid as she accepts her trophies, but while sitting at a chessboard in competition, she is quietly fierce.
She began playing chess as a young child, along with her two sisters. Her parents had an idea that, even though women were not respected in chess, they, with their three girls, could raise chess champions. The girls were guinea pigs in their experiment and ate, breathed, and slept chess.
There are several points in the doc where the discussion of specific moves and the game itself gets into the weeds for your average viewer. It began to go over my head a little bit, and I know how to play chess. But it is always quickly explained by Judit or another chess professional, and they bring you to at least a basic understanding of the techniques they are discussing. Chess enthusiasts in particular will appreciate that they never talk down to you.
The upbeat music sets the perfect tone for the film because it reminds you that chess doesn’t have to be for older men with patches at their elbows. Chess is a sport full of strategy, intelligence, and study that ranges from years before to the very moments you are sitting in the game. Queen Of Chess turned out to be a good release from Netflix, so you can be confident that you’ll enjoy it!
Runtime: 94 minutes
Motion Picture Rating: PG
Languages Spoken In The Film: English
Should You Watch It? Yes
Did I Cry? Nope
My Rating: 3.5/5 Stars
Available: Free on Netflix
