More Than Just Ocean's 11 During World War II: An Important Episode in the War Against the Nazis

Rating: 8/10 (1 March 2014)

The first scene of the film is set in a church in Ghent, Belgium. Clerics are busily taking down a large paneled altarpiece which appears to be late medieval/early renaissance in its style. It's the Ghent Altarpiece, one of the most famous artworks ever forged in Europe. The panels are hastily taken down and put into a truck. Word is the Nazis are on their way to confiscate the work, possibly ordered by Adolph Hitler himself.
We often think of Nazi-Germany in terms of what they did in battle and/or to certain religious and ethnic groups in Hitler's "Final Solution". However, the Nazis didn't limit themselves only to the gunfire on the battlefields and the horrors of the concentration camps. Another aspect of Nazi-Germany's rape of Europe was the destruction of cultural heritage and legacy, particularly by plundering Europe's artwork from public museums and private collections. In nearly every country the Nazis overrun, they plundered museums and large private collections. It wasn't enough that they subjugated large populations to their totalitarian regime; they also stole their identities. The Monuments Men were a real-life group of "soldiers" assigned the daunting task of retrieving the art confiscated by the Nazis towards the end of the war. This film is about their story.
George Clooney plays Frank Stokes who outlines the importance of retrieving the lost art: "You can wipe out an entire generation, you can burn their homes to the ground and somehow they'll still find their way back. But if you destroy their history, you destroy their achievements and it's as if they never existed. That's what Hitler wants and that's exactly what we are fighting for." An evil power can subjugate France, but if it destroys the Louvre or Versailles, France itself becomes nearly destroyed. Save the Louvre and Versailles, France lives on.
After the Ghent Altarpiece scene and Stokes' speech, "the Monuments Men" rings a bit like "Ocean's 11", with Clooney soliciting art historians, scholars, and restorers from different parts of the United States. He puts together a small band of misfits who are either too old or too ill-equipped to be involved in the war on the front-lines. This is their way of being involved in the conflict in a significant way. Their mission: to find and retrieve the lost artwork either from public museums or private collections. The cast is a Who's Who of famous name talent in addition to Clooney: Matt Damon, Hugh Booneville, John Goodman, Bill Murray, and Bob Balaban, just to name a few.
The band breaks off into smaller groups and each has their own story. One of the most interesting is that of real-life figure Rose Valland, although they changed her name to Claire Simone in the story. She has been spying on the Nazis while they've been abducting many great artworks in Paris. In real life, she became a heroine in the cause of stopping the Nazis from their plundering. In the film, she meets James Granger (Matt Damon), who needs her help in finding the art. At first she is reticent, believing he only wants to bring the art back to US museums. In another group, there's Richard Campbell and Preston Savitz (Murray and Balaban) who are following leads into the European countryside, hoping to find some of the lost treasures. Other members go by themselves seeking to save art not yet pilfered by the Nazis, such as Donald Jeffries who goes to the church housing a Madonna and Child by Michelangelo. Eventually the groups will converge and they hit the jack-pot in a way that would make auction houses Southeby's and Christie's salivate.
Although much of the story is a bit exaggerated and doesn't always ring of true history, this is still a very enjoyable film about a subject which has had much less screen-time devoted to it than other subjects of World War II, at least in the United States. (Europe has been all too aware of the devastation of its art at the hands of the Nazis.) Aspects of "the Monuments Men" recall the rather idealized films of the late 1950's and early 1960's, such as "the Great Escape" and "the Longest Day". (The music soundtrack seems inspired by such films with one passage using a whistle and piccolo to intone its patriotic melody, similar to the Great Escape). Not quite a great film, but a good one.