''Word Wars: Tiles and Tribulations on the Scrabble Circuit'' is a 2004 American

documentary film A documentary film (often described simply as a documentary) is a nonfiction Film, motion picture intended to "document reality, primarily for instruction, education or maintaining a Recorded history, historical record". The American author and ...

directed by Eric Chaikin and Julian Petrillo about competitive ''

Scrabble ''Scrabble'' is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a Board game, game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, re ...

''. The film was an official selection at the 2004

Sundance film festival The Sundance Film Festival is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with 423,234 combined in-person and online viewership in 2023. The festival has acted ...

, had a 25-city theatrical run, was included as part of the Discovery Times Channel's "Screening Room" series, and was nominated for numerous awards, including a 2004 Documentary

Emmy The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the year, each with their own set of rules and award catego ...

for "Best Artistic or Cultural Programming" and an International Documentary Association (IDA) Award. The film is distributed by 7th Art Releasing. The film follows four players in the nine months leading up to the 2002

National Scrabble Championship The Scrabble Players Championship (formerly the North American Scrabble Championship, and earlier the National Scrabble Championship) is the largest ''Scrabble'' competition in North America. The event is currently held every year, and from 2004 t ...

, which was held in

San Diego San Diego ( , ) is a city on the Pacific coast of Southern California, adjacent to the Mexico–United States border. With a population of over 1.4 million, it is the List of United States cities by population, eighth-most populous city in t ...

California California () is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States that lies on the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. It borders Oregon to the north, Nevada and Arizona to the east, and shares Mexico–United States border, an ...

: Joe Edley, Matt Graham, Marlon Hill, and Joel Sherman. These players, as does Chaikin, also appear in Stefan Fatsis's book '' Word Freak''. Fatsis and Chaikin are both tournament ''Scrabble'' players themselves.''The Washington Times'' "Fightin' words spur vivid documentary" page M24 accessed via Ebbsco's Australia New Zealand Reference Centre 20 June 2007

Soundtrack

* E Wolf & the Moneylenders – "Paralyzed" (Written by Chalkin & Haber) * Your Mom – "The One" (Written by Your Mom) * The Minutemen – "Do You Want New Wave (Or Do You Want the Truth)" (Written by Mike Watt) * The Minutemen – "The Glory of Man" (Written by Mike Watt) * Andrew Chaikin & Austin Willacy – "

Across the Universe "Across the Universe" is a song by the English rock band the Beatles. It was written by John Lennon and credited to Lennon–McCartney. The song first appeared on the 1969 various artists' charity compilation album ''No One's Gonna Change Our W ...

" (Written by

John Lennon John Winston Ono Lennon (born John Winston Lennon; 9 October 19408 December 1980) was an English singer-songwriter, musician and activist. He gained global fame as the founder, co-lead vocalist and rhythm guitarist of the Beatles. Lennon's ...

and

Paul McCartney Sir James Paul McCartney (born 18 June 1942) is an English singer, songwriter and musician who gained global fame with the Beatles, for whom he played bass guitar and the piano, and shared primary songwriting and lead vocal duties with John ...

) * Joel Sherman – "Across the Universe" (Written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney)

References

External links

* Documentary films about words and language Works about Scrabble 2004 films 2004 documentary films American documentary films Documentary films about competitions Films shot in Baltimore 2000s English-language films 2000s American films English-language documentary films {{arts-documentary-film-stub