"Monuments Men" allowed me to enjoy a riveting and entertaining story about the best of humanity.

Rating: 10/10 (8 February 2014)

I loved it. Anything with Matt Damon or George Clooney is an automatic "Go see!" for me. Add John Goodman and Cate Blanchet and it only gets better. I heard one or two unflattering critics' comments about the movie a week or so ago, and was a little nervous that maybe the Laws of the Cosmos had been reversed in some fashion and the movie would not be good, despite its can't-lose topic and Oscar-great cast. I needn't have worried- it was marvelous.
I don't want this to be about what's wrong with those critics, but perhaps you'll find a small bit of that helpful to decide that you should treat yourself to this wonderful project? I suspect that if anyone didn't find themselves entranced and entertained it might have been because they were expecting something else. "Saving Captain America" or something.
The film deals with choices we make as a people. What do we value? What might be worth fighting and dying for? Personal power, glory, and money? (read: the Nazis' and Stalinists' cause). Or human striving for charm and grace and love and compassion and harmony and "art," as imperfectly as we may have carried that out? (read: the Allies' cause, in principle, anyway).
This IS a thrilling movie- but the thrills are very real, thus not sexy. I'm a scholar by trade (social psychology) and have studied this era and human relations extensively. As near as I can determine, this is how the war went for most people. And this project in real life, I hear, was rather quiet, and not thought to be glamorous- despite its "monumental" importance and its consequences for humanity (pardon the pun).
There is real danger in the movie. And suspense- made more gripping by the vast scale of the stakes... but of course made a bit more bearable by our knowledge that we won the war, and saved a vast chunk of our cultural heritage with the mission depicted in this movie.
For myself, I felt a surge of pride toward the end when the movie showed filmed newsreel items, re-enacted from the day. Yes, it showed the Army generals gloating over the cache of more than one hundred tons (!!! - worth more than $4 BILLION at today's price) of stolen gold recovered from the salt mine where the Nazis had hidden it. Hey- I'd gloat too! But it also showed the overall integrity of the Allies illustrated by their care and concern to return the art - worth jillions of dollars - to the countries, families, cities, museums, that were the rightful owners.
That just reminded me that while the flag-waving and money-making and glory-seeking may be the norm in this world, there are also millions of decent, honest, caring, compassionate, and spectacularly honorable humans among us. It feels good to know they were there then; it heartens me to suddenly realize that they are still out there today.
"Monuments Men" allowed me to enjoy a riveting and entertaining story about the best of humanity.