Based on the novel by Walter Tevis, this coming-of-age story explores the true cost of genius. In the late 1950s, young Beth Harmon (Anya Taylor-Joy) is abandoned and entrusted to an orphanage in Kentucky. She has an amazing talent for chess and is addicted to the tranquilizers provided to children by the government. Haunted by her own demons, Beth, under the dual effects of drugs and obsession, has become an impressive, skilled and charismatic outcast, determined to break the traditional boundaries established by the male-dominated chess world.