The film is based upon a book written by Spanish novelist Arturo Pérez-Reverte, a thriller whose storyline centres on the game of chess and an old painting, which reveals its secrets, (hence the title), when being restored.
As the opening credits slip down screen, we see some of the classic vistas of Barcelona: Gaudí’s Sagrada Familia Cathedral, the aerial view of the port from a cable car that crosses the city, with the statue of Columbus at the bottom of La Rambla.
Kate Beckinsale plays the restorer who sneezes any time a man tries to get serious with her, and who will see the human chess pieces dying off just when they begin to be suspected of the crime: “who killed the Knight?”The Black Queen, who redeems her own reputation when she becomes one more of the murder victims, lives in the Castillo de Santa Florentina, which in the real world is situated just outside Canet de Mar