Screen Play: Cinematic Visions of Video Games and Sports
Programmed by: Chris Todd Carloy, Kent Lambert, and Sierra Wilson
This quarter, Doc Films helps celebrate the Year of Games at the University of Chicago with a series devoted to games and game cultures. The series is divided into two parts, with the first half of the quarter presenting films related to video games, the second half spotlighting traditional sports, and 2013’s Computer Chess as a bridge between the two. Video game-related selections were chosen to represent four categories: early experiments in video game-to-movie adaptation (Mortal Kombat); family friendly movies with game-focused narratives (The Wizard); movies that influenced video game form and history (Battle Royale); and a recent cycle of commercially successful movies based on game franchises (Pokémon: Detective Pikachu). Sports films for the series were selected to reflect the diversity of personal, social, political, and emotional contexts and meanings of sports. Our Computer Chess screening will be a very special reunion: the film’s writer/director Andrew Bujalski will be present for Q&A, along with other members of the film’s cast and crew, including UChicago Computer Science professor Gordon Kindlmann.
Battle Royale (2000)
Kinji Fukasaku · 113m · DCP
While not the first representation in cinema of a dystopic fight-to-the-death competition, Battle Royale kicked off a cycle of mega-franchises on the theme, as well as lent its name to a now-ubiquitous multiplayer videogame genre and establishing some of its core features: limited resources, a map that gets smaller and smaller, and a sole-surviving victor.
Thursday, January 8 9:30 PM
Mortal Kombat (1995)
Paul W.S. Anderson · 101m · 35mm
An early example of videogame-to-movie adaptation, Mortal Kombat mixes martial arts action with the flamboyant CGI of the mid-90s, a techno-industrial soundtrack by George S. Clinton and Stabbing Westward, and the demonic stylings that helped make the game series a target of moral panic. Upon his passing in late 2025, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa was justly remembered for his iconic portrayal of Mortal Kombat villain Shang Tsung.
Thursday, January 15 9:30 PM
The Wizard (1989)
Todd Holland · 100m · DCP
Produced in collaboration with Nintendo, The Wizard is at once a transparent marketing ploy for the company’s "Power Glove" controller and the soon-to-be-released Super Mario Bros. 3 and a colorful snapshot of children’s culture of the late 1980s. Starring Fred Savage, Jenny Lewis, and Christian Slater, this road movie/family dramedy concludes with a high-stakes game tournament prefiguring modern e-sports culture.
Thursday, January 22 9:30 PM
Pokémon: Detective Pikachu (2019)
Rob Letterman · 105m · DCP
Detective Pikachu is the first and only live-action film based on the world’s highest-grossing media franchise. Shot by John Mathieson on Kodak 35mm film and starring Ryan Reynolds, Ken Watanabe, Bill Nighy, and Justice Smith, Detective Pikachu arguably marked the beginning of the "wait, video game adaptations can be good?" era in which we currently reside. Pokémon Go to this screening!
Thursday, January 29 9:30 PM
Computer Chess (2013)
Andrew Bujalski · 91m · 35mm
Set in 1980 at a computer chess tournament inside a drab hotel, Computer Chess is a singular period piece in which the period trappings include massive mainframe computer systems, Human Potential Movement (HPM) hippies, and the analog black & white (er, gray & gray) video cameras that capture the film’s subtly surreal events. In its exploration of existential themes invoked by spectres of tech utopia and AI dominance, Computer Chess will likely read as uncannily prescient in 2026.
Followed by Q&A with writer/director Andrew Bujalski, cast and crew member (and UChicago Computer Science professor) Gordon Kindlmann, and others. Print courtesy of the Chicago Film Society.
Thursday, February 5 8:30 PM
Love & Basketball (2000)
Gina Prince-Bythewood · 124m · DCP
From writer-director Gina Prince-Bythewood (The Woman King), Love & Basketball follows next door neighbors Monica and Quincy from child basketball stardom through the personal and professional trials of early adulthood. Sanaa Lathan and Omar Epps star in this romantic drama about dreams, expectations, and the give and take of life and love — just in time for Valentine’s Day!
Thursday, February 12 9:30 PM · Saturday, February 14 9:30 PM
Raging Bull (1980)
Martin Scorsese · 129m · DCP
This biopic of 1940s middleweight champion Jake LaMotta — adapted for screen from the boxer’s memoir — is a brutal meditation on the show-business of professional sports presented in shimmering black and white cinematography. The violence of the boxing ring and the quarrels of domestic life become inseparable as LaMotta (Robert DeNiro) terrorizes his family and stands to lose everything.
Thursday, February 19 9:00 PM · Saturday, February 21 9:00 PM
Bend It Like Beckham (2002)
Gurinder Chadha · 112m · 35mm
When British Punjabi girl Jess’s skills with a football get her recruited to a high-level girl’s team, she finds herself facing a crisis of identity. Gurinder Chadha’s deft directing and screenplay successfully threads comedy and joy into the movie’s meditation on family obligations, generation gaps, and the intersections of gender, sexuality, and race in sports, all set to a banging international Y2K soundtrack.
Thursday, February 26 9:30 PM · Saturday, February 28 4:00 PM
Tokyo Olympiad (1965)
Kon Ichikawa · 170m · DCP
This documentary record of the 1964 Tokyo Olympics by director Kon Ichikawa (The Burmese Harp, Odd Obsession) centers the visual and emotional spectacle of the Olympic Games, the materiality of athletic competition, and the beauty and power of the human body on screen. Presented here in its original 170-minute runtime, Tokyo Olympiad concludes our Year of Games series on the grandest of stages.
