The Luzhin Defence

“Two worlds collide when an eccentric genius falls in love with a strong-willed society beauty.”

In Italy in the 1920s, a world-class chess tournament draws the grandmaster Aleksandr Ivanovich "Sascha" Luzhin (John Turturro). There he meets Natalia Katkov (Emily Watson), a young woman who is drawn to him, and Marleen Gorris adapts Nabokov's novel around the two of them. Luzhin's mind is already tormented, and as love pulls at him, his hold on the game and on himself is what he stands to lose.