Our Price: £ 25.15 (only UK)

Publisher: Fridrik Gudmundsson, 2010
Edition: DVD
Extra : bonus material
ISBN: 978-9935-404-22-0
Video system: PAL
Video playing time: 83 minutes
Language: English

Perhaps the most difficult thing in life is how to accomodate other people, learning to live with others and respect their views without constant collisions...

The phone rang in the middle of the night, waking Saemi up. “There is a collect call for you Sir; from Bobby Fischer. Will you accept it?” His friend, the former world champion of chess, the American hero, was in trouble. Bobby Fischer called “collect” from a public phone in prison in Japan.

Sæmundur did not hesitate one moment – this man must be rescued. It does not matter if he has not met his friend for three decades and only heard his voice over phone just few times all this time. His friend was in trouble and Sæmi is a friend indeed.

Bobby Fischer became world champion in chess in Reykjavík in 1972, the first of which Americans had and thereby defeating the virtually indestructible Soviet chess machine that was dominating the chess sport.

The Cold War was at it´s peak and Bobby became national hero in the United States. The same year Sæmi and Bobby became friends in Reykjavík.

In this documentary viewers get to know Sæmi rock´s struggle for the liberation of Bobby from prison in Japan and how he managed to provide his friend Icelandic citizenship.

In the movie are individual interviews with Bobby Fischer after he settled in Iceland.

The story of an unlikely friendship between the notorious chess grandmaster Bobby Fischer imprisoned in a Japanese jail and his Icelandic bodyguard Saemi Rock Palsson who fought the wrath of the United States government to free his friend.

A rock is a real friend you can depend on in times of trouble.

Left to rot in a Japanese prison by the US authorities, the genius chess champion and fallen hero Bobby Fischer, knew there was only one man who could fit the bill and get him out of jail – his old friend Saemi Rock Palsson. But he hadn’t spoken to him in 20 years.

Saemi Palsson – an Icelandic carpenter and former policeman who earned the nickname ‘Rock’ after he became Iceland’s top Rock ‘n’ Roll dancer – had been a bodyguard for Bobby Fischer at the 1972 World Chess Championship staged in Reykjavik.

The legendary contest at the height of the Cold War between Brooklyn boy Fischer and Russian Boris Spassky saw Fischer defeat the Soviets and become not only the world champion but an all-American hero.

However, the championship had been beset with problems due to Fischer’s growing paranoia and his outlandish demands. Standing by him every step of the way was Saemi Rock Palsson employed to act as Fischer’s bodyguard…

NOTE: This DVD (PAL) is not coded to play on North American NTSC DVD players!

More Bobby Fischer products here.

Trailer