The opening is the Worrall Attack in the Ruy Lopez. It became a very popular opening at the GM level in the mid-1990's as a sort of "antidote" to the Marshall. The best-known Worrall games of recent times were between Nigel Short and Anatoly Karpov in their 1992 Candidates Match in Linares. But the Worrall has a long history. It was a favorite of Paul Keres (who developed much theory on the opening) as well as Arthur Bisguier (wh played it a great deal during the 1940's and 50's). The opening's leading player today is GM Sergei Tiviakov, who published a short theoretical on it in Inside Chess in the mid-1990's. Judit Polgar used to play the Worrall in the 1990's but has since given it up.

The players in the Hamburg game were named Roesch and Schlage. Little is known about them, but their game has become possibly the most famous chess game ever due to its inclusion in Kubrick's film:

Roesch - Schlage [C86]
Hamburg, 1910

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.Qe2
This is the defining move of the Worrall Attack. The idea is to defend the e4-pawn while setting up the moves 0-0 and Rd1 (to support the advance of the d-pawn to d4).

5...b5 6.Bb3 Be7 7.c3 0-0 8.0-0 d5

[8...Bb7 These days this is the preferred move instead of the immediate break in the center.] ................ [13.Re1 White's last chance to save the game by grabbing the open file and attacking both the e5-Knight and e7-Bishop.]

13...Bh3
This is the initial position shown on the screen in 2001: A Space Odyssey.

14.Qxa6
White abandons the long diagonal and now mate is forced.

14...Bxg2 15.Re1 Qf3
In the film, this move was incorrectly given by HAL9000 as "Queen to Bishop Three".

Here's the forced mate sequence:
[15...Qf3 16.Qc8 Rxc8 17.h3 Nxh3+ 18.Kh2 Ng4#]

0-1

So what's the mystery contained within this game? Without (I hope) giving too much away for those few who've not yet seen the film, HAL9000 later suffers a malfunction (with disastrous consequences). Take a look at the note above to Black's 15th move. HAL incorrectly states the move as "Queen to Bishop Three"; it's actually "Queen to Bishop Six".

A debate has raged for thirty years over this line in the movie. Was it just a garden variety descriptive notation error (of the kind that has caused algebraic notation the become the new standard)? Or was there something more sinister about the error? Was it in fact a bit of foreshadowing on the part of the filmmaker, to let attentive viewers know that something bad was going to happen later?

I've heard excellent arguments for both sides in this debate. My personal opinion is that it's just a descriptive notation screwup (but you have to realize that I'm one of those "algebraic guys"). I used to edit a chess newsletter and I never received a submitted gamescore in descriptive notation that was error-free -- never. So from personal experience I'm inclined to believe that Kubrick simply screwed up the notation.

There are more neat little puzzles and unanswered questions in the film, but since this is supposed to be a chess column, we'll limit ourselves to the chess-related questions.

It's a pretty well-known fact that Stanley Kubrick was a chess fanatic, which easily accounts for the two chess references in 2001. The lesser-known of the chess references is the presence of a "Dr. Smyslov" who makes a brief appearance in a short scene early in the film. American scientist Dr. Haywood Floyd is en route to Tycho Base on the lunar surface, but must "change flights" at a space station orbiting the Earth. While waiting for his ship's departure, he stops at a lounge and has a conversation with an old acquaintance. During the conversation, he's introduced to Dr. Smyslov. The chess reference here, of course, is to Vasily Smyslov, World Chess Champion from 1957 to 1958.