Chess in the Stream: The Pale Blue Eye

(No spoilers) The Pale Blue Eye is a Netflix film based on a novel by Louis Bayard. It is a murder mystery set at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in the 1830s. It features Edgar Allan Poe, who was in fact a cadet at the time.

Chess appears briefly in two scenes. The first instance is when two cadets are playing and we get this close-up of the board:

I brightened the image so you can see the pieces clearly. It is White's move. Here is the position:

As you can readily see, White has a huge advantage, as Black has left his queen unprotected. Taking it gives White mate in 8, according to Stockfish. But even if White is blind to this move, he can cast a pale blue eye over Qxe2 or Nc7+ and still have a significant advantage.

But the camera hovers over the board long enough for us to see White make his own terrible mistake. He plays a4.

Even after making this ghastly blunder, White still has a +1.4 advantage.

The second chess reference occurs later, when Artemus asks his father, Dr. Marquis for a game.

"Shall I try the scholar's again or something more challenging this time?" the doctor replies.

We can only assume he is twitting his son about Scholar's Mate, which, as any poor novice has learned, is a four-move disaster that usually goes 1. e4 e5 2. Bc4 Nc6 3. Qh5 Nf6 4. Qxf7#.

Scholar's Mate still catches beginners almost 200 years later, but chess positions on film haven't advanced much either.