Critic Reviews

Magnus Carlsen, called the Mozart of chess, became world champion in 2013 at the age of 22. Benjamin Ree’s rousing documentary shows us how this taciturn prodigy got there, and how his family keeps him sane.

An engaging study of a beautiful but mysterious mind, which also reveals the stressful nature of world-class chess tournaments and raises the deep question of where intelligence actually comes from.

To make a movie about such an elusive figure is a challenging undertaking, and it’s a testament to the quality of Magnus that the film succeeds as well as it does.

Ree makes things easy for people who don't play chess, deftly pacing Carlsen's triumphs and failures and milking the suspense as "the Mozart of chess" employs his intuition to win, in an age when many players depend on computers to hone their skills.

The loneliness of the long-distance chess grandmaster is affectingly conveyed in Magnus.

Magnus, it turns out, is the anti-Bobby: a fascinatingly “normalized” prodigy.

[Ree] virtually never surprises us, making his film more a celebratory hagiography for proud Norwegians than anything the rest of the world, in and out of chess, can embrace.

It’s too brief to convey the intellect and almost mystical ability that underpin Carlsen’s success.

Watching the goofy boy develop into a man, we share in his experiences and root for him each step of the way.

Magnus is gifted with a tremendous opportunity and mostly squanders it, creating a profile that certainly admires Carlsen, but does little to uncover the methodology or magic behind the dazzling display he demonstrates on the board.