Unlike so much of the art saved, not a masterpiece

Rating: Null/10 (19 October 2014)

This is a war movie with a difference: instead of being about killing men, it is about saving cultural works. Set in the second half of the Second World War, it is the loosely true story of how the Allies put together a team of art specialists - in what was formally called the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives section - to don army uniform and follow hard behind combat troops as they liberated Western Europe from the Nazis. Thhe film has references at the beginning and the end to the magnificent Ghent Altarpiece which I have seen and admired - just one of millions of artefacts rescued by this operation.
There were in fact around 345 such Monuments Men (and women) from up to 17 nations, but inevitably the movie has to focus on a small number - just seven - and almost all of them are played by big name American actors including George Clooney, Matt Damon, Bill Murray and John Goodman. Britain is represented by Hugh Bonneville, while France has Jean Dujardin, and for good measure we have the ever-wonderful Cate Blanchett.
So such an interesting story and stellar cast would seem to promise a high-class movie, but sadly it is a rather flawed work. The sweep is so extensive that we have a series of episodes involving different characters and locations with a lack of real narrative drive. Also the script is rather weak and the overall approach too comedic for such a serious subject. The responsibility for both strengths and weaknesses has to be shouldered largely by George Clooney since he is director, co-producer and co-writer as well as the lead actor. I am a huge admirer of Clooney's work but this, while well-intentioned, is not his best.
In Britain, the is a particular reservation about "The Monuments Men" because the character portrayed by Bonneville - one of the two MPAA officers killed on duty - is fictional and there is no reference to the real-life British hero Ronald Balfour who was killed saving church artefacts in Cleves.