Salubfoto It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

Iseerphia All that we are seeing on the screen is happening with real people, real action sequences in the background, forcing the eye to watch as if we were there.

Bluebell Alcock Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Paynbob It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

SnoopyStyle Eugene Brown (Cuba Gooding Jr.) just got out of prison. His daughter Katrina doesn't want to deal with him and he's desperate to prove his worth to her. He gets a job as a janitor at an inner city D.C. school. The kids chase out the teacher monitoring detention and Sheila King (LisaGay Hamilton) puts Eugene in charge for a minute. He does such a great job that she puts him in charge permanently. He starts teaching them to play chess. The effort is opposed by drug lord Perry.It's yet another 'teach inner city kids something different'. It takes a few different turns than the usual genre movie. The hurdles are a little different. Cuba is relatively good. The young kids are all great. Jake Goldberger's directing is not terribly inventive. It's more of a solid TV movie that is slightly better than the average movie in the genre.

JayDoubleU84 "Life of a King" is a good movie with a great story, good actors and an excellent Cuba Gooding Jr. as main character. It's all about morals, ethics and the meaning of life and constantly reminds us that we are responsible for our own actions. Sure we've seen the same kind of movie before. "Dangerous Minds" for example to name just one. However, it does not get old and keeps you entertained the whole time. There was not one single boring moment. The chess "theme" I really liked. For once it's not football! And even as an experienced chess-player myself I can say that everything is totally legit and realistic.Nothing more to say. Watch it.

jeremyhanselgonzal I'm all for using movies about chess, or about any other matter, to tell a story with intent.But in real life, in real chess games, unless you have above average or even good understanding of the game, it is boring. So they stepped up the tempo a tad for good storytelling. Although to some real players, they'll immediately spot the inaccuracies.The principal did not demonstrate any knowledge whatsoever about chess. Nothing shown on the movie that is. And yet she had that ominous comment while she was watching the 'bad guy's game that he was "really good". The scene where T just won the last match on his first tournament and what do you know, a second after that the tournament admin shows up and tells him he was disqualified because he didn't have complete credentials. In real life, that guy would be in trouble. From EVERYONE there. Why did they let him finish the tournament and THEN spring the news to him? Might as well say, "Oh, you know what, you're disqualified. But thank you for wasting a lot of time and energy on this tournament. We hope we didn't break your heart and discourage you at all."And that help the chessman was supposed to coach T about? He started out with describing how his opponent would use the queen to hammer him, or some such. In real life, that is JUST NOT how you coach chess if you have decent enough skills to actually coach it. At least it should have been something vague, like how the guy would like to play a closed game. Preferred openings. Something like that. Not a specific piece that the opponent likes to use to win games. That's just ridiculous.In other words, they could have paid a little more respect for people who actually like and play the game on a regular basis. You know how some movies make you cringe, not in horror, but because there are just some scenes that are downright terrible? That's because most likely, the scene is an insult to your intelligence. And for chess players, there are scenes like that.Don't get me wrong though. Aside from these inaccuracies, it's a great movie. Worth watching at least once.

Tony Heck "This is a king. This is your life. One mistake and it can be taken away." Eugene Brown (Gooding Jr.) is an ex-felon who is struggling to find a job and relate to his kids. After finding a job as a high school janitor he is asked to watch the detention kids one day until they can find a replacement. When he brings up the topic of chess he begins to change the lives of the "troubled kids" forever. I love movies based on true stories, but I was worried about seeing this going in. One one hand a true story with Cuba Gooding Jr, that is good. On the other hand though I thought how many times can they remake Lean On Me? After movies like that one and Dangerous Minds, Freedom Writers, Fame, etc... I wondered how different can this one be. While I have to admit it wasn't 100% different it was very very good and much much better then I was expecting. The best part about this movie is that it stayed just a step or two away from being way to cheesy to be enjoyed but it did a good job of changing things just enough to keep it feeling real while keeping the emotion that it needed. Different enough from the previous "helping inner city kids" movies to make it interesting and worth seeing. Overall, very good and never took the over-the-top cheesy way out that so many of these types of movies do. That is a good thing and because of that I highly recommend the movie. I give this an A-.