Despite that, no one could talk Bobby out of his belief that Kasparov and Karpov were “crooks.” Bobby remained resolute in his views, even though almost all grandmasters and many other members of the chess fraternity insisted that his accusations had no credible foundation. A scientist at the Center for Bioformatics and Molecular Biostatistics of the University of California, Mark Segal, proved mathematically that such a charge was specious and that the moves in the 1985 contest were more statistically likely to have occurred than Fischer’s own shutouts of Taimanov and Larsen, and his near total defeat of Petrosian. Segal concluded his scholarly paper by facetiously musing, “Perhaps Fischer’s ascent to world champion was part of some conspiracy.”
Some people believed that Bobby was still stewing over the fact that he’d refused to play Karpov in 1975, and therefore was trying to belittle Karpov’s resulting match with Kasparov. Others held that his accusations were a ploy to promote his new Fischer Random chess. Still others chalked them up to simple paranoia. For his part, Bobby never explained what either Karpov or Kasparov had to gain from prearranging match results, except to keep the title in the Russian family. But since both men were Russian that made no sense.
If gratitude is the heart’s memory, Bobby’s call to remembrance was weak or sometimes nonexistent. Not only did the stouthearted Icelanders on the RJF Committee manage to extricate him from a Japanese jail and a looming ten-year prison term, they did everything they could for him once he arrived in their country: finding him a place to live, protecting him from exploiters and prying journalists, advising him on his finances, driving him to the thermal baths, inviting him to dinners and holiday celebrations, taking him fishing and on tours throughout the country, trying to make him feel at home.
Indeed, they created a cultlike following around Bobby, treating him almost as seventeenth-century royalty. Each functionary had his own role to play in granting whatever wishes the king requested. What they didn’t expect was that the king would respond to even the smallest failure with an “off with his head!” attitude. Bobby had behaved this way in his teen years, displaying unforgiving impatience toward any of his young followers who chanced, inadvertently, to displease him. Now, in Reykjavik, despite being the recipient of numerous acts of kindness and generosity, Bobby began finding fault, negatively overgeneralizing, and snapping at those who’d shown him the most loyalty.
His first break was with his obsequious bodyguard Saemi Palsson. Palsson had never been paid anything (“not a cent,” he complained, although there was a report that Bobby gave him a check for $300 before he went back to Iceland) for the months of bodyguard work he’d provided for Bobby in Reykjavik in 1972 and in the United States after the match. And Palsson had been the initial Icelander to join forces with Bobby in his attempt to get out of jail. Palsson had traveled to Japan at his own expense, and he continued to help when Bobby became an Icelandic citizen. Palsson had ample reason to expect goodwill from Bobby. The seeds of their ultimate break were sown, though, when, even prior to Bobby’s departure from Japan, Palsson was approached by an Icelandic filmmaker, Fridrik Gudmundsson, to do a documentary for Icelandic television about Bobby’s incarceration, the fight to release him, and his escape to freedom. Palsson and Bobby might see some money, it was suggested, if the film made a profit, although it was highly unlikely for a documentary to realize even a slight windfall.
Bobby initially agreed to cooperate, but with the explicit caveat that the film was to be a dissertation on the evils of the United States, not about his personal life or about chess. As Bobby envisioned it, it would be mainly about his “kidnapping” (as he referred to his arrest and detention) and escape.
Filming began the moment Bobby touched down in Copenhagen, with a camera in the sports vehicle that drove him, Miyoko, and Saemi to Sweden, en route to Iceland. Shot using various cinema verité techniques, with low production values, the film was poorly edited and thematically scattered. It was produced for 30 million kronur (about $500,000 dollars). The initial footage was intriguing, however, since it provided the first real glimpse of Bobby since his match with Spassky in 1992. Bobby was clear-eyed and focused as he forcefully held forth: “I hate America: it’s an illegitimate state. It was robbed from the Native Americans and built by black African slaves. It has no right to exist.” As he delivered his poison against the Jews, the Japanese government, and the United States, he was oddly frisky, as if he’d just become aware that he was free. He and Saemi began to sing “That’s Amore” and other familiar old songs, almost as if they were long-lost friends—as they were at that time—taking a ride in the country and singing to pass the time. There was even laughter on occasion. Miyoko sat quietly, her Mona Lisa smile emerging as she looked with reverence at Bobby.
Continuing to shoot the film in Reykjavik over the next months, Gudmundsson kept trying to pin down Bobby for further interviews and increase his involvement in the project. “What’s the title of the film going to be?” Bobby asked. When he was told it was My Friend Bobby (it was eventually changed to Me and Bobby Fischer), he immediately began to question the whole endeavor. “This is a film that is supposed to be about my kidnapping, not about Saemi,” he complained. Then money became an obstacle. Bobby was angry that he was not being given any “up front” money. Gudmundsson offered Bobby 15 percent of the profits, with Saemi, the producer Steinthor Birgisson, and Gudmundsson also getting 15 percent each, the remaining 40 percent to be paid to the coproduction partners. Fischer was furious. Why was Saemi being paid anything? And since the film was about Bobby, why shouldn’t he receive more money than the others? “I should be paid at least 30 percent,” he argued vehemently, “more than anyone else because I am Bobby Fischer.” He repeated this refrain over and over again: “I am Bobby Fischer! I am Bobby Fischer! I am Bobby Fischer!”
Gudmundsson tried to explain what he was doing. He told Bobby that the film had the potential to become a masterpiece: “This will be a postmodernist documentary with feature elements.”
“Never mind about that,” Bobby shouted. “Tell me what the film is going to be about.”
Gudmundsson mapped it out in writing in an all-inclusive public relations proposaclass="underline"
This film is about the atom bomb.
This film is about a retired policeman.
This film is about unconditional love.
This film is about a world champion of chess.
This film is about unconditional hate.
This film is about an icon.
This film is about victory.
This film is about the war on terror.
This film is about an international fugitive.
This film is about insanity.
This film is about rockdancing.
The more of the description Bobby read, the more disgusted he became with the film, with Gudmundsson, and with Saemi. Bobby appealed to the members of the RJF Committee to see if they could help stop the film or get an injunction issued before it was completed. Sympathetic to Bobby’s plight, the committee circulated to its members a letter of protest that was ultimately sent to Icelandic Television, other media, and to the financial backers and distributors of the film. Bobby changed some of the wording of the protest before it was mailed, making it much stronger and less diplomatic. It read, in part:
Mr. Fischer wishes the group to draw attention to the fact the manuscript and structure of the aforementioned “documentary,” of which he is the main subject, are grossly inconsistent with further discussions and that the material was obtained by fraud.