The Monuments Men is a 2014 biographical film directed by George Clooney and starring Clooney, Matt Damon, John Goodman, Bill Murray, Hugh Boneville, Cate Blanchett, Jean Dujardin and Bob Balaban.
The film is based on the non-fiction book The Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History, by Robert M. Edsel. The film follows an Allied group called the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program, tasked with finding and saving pieces of art and other culturally important items before their destruction by Hitler during World War II.
- Directed by: George Clooney
- Produced by: George Clooney, Grant Heslov
- Written by: George Clooney, Grant Heslov
- Based on: The Monuments Men by Robert M. Edsel
- Starring: George Clooney, Matt Damon, John Goodman, Bill Murray, Hugh Boneville
- Music by: Alexandre Desplat
The Monuments Men - Official Trailer -3 HD - 2014
- Cinematography: Phedon Papamichael
- Edited by: Stephen Mirrione
- Country: Germany, United States
- Language: English, French. German
- Running time: 118 minutes
- Budget: $70 million
- Box Office: $155 million
- Release date: February 5, 2014
- Distributed by: Columbia Pictures, 20th Century Fox
Plot[]
In 1943, during World War II, Paris is occupied by the Nazis.
Claire Simone (Cate Blanchett), a french art historian, is forced in Paris to assist Nazi officers like Viktor Stahl (Justus von Dohnányi) to oversee the theft of art for the Nazis
At Paris, the french curator Claire Simone assists the Nazi officers in their pursue of stealing art.
But Claire is in fact working for the resistance, and she take advantage of working with the nazis to obtain information about them. While she's working for them, she realizes the Nazis want the art stolen for either Adolf Hitler's proposed Führermuseum in Linz, or for the personal property of senior commanders like Herman Goering.
Meanwhile in the United States, Liutenant and professor Fran Stokes (George Clooney) persuades the American President that the soon victory of the Allies will have little meaning if the artistic treasures of Western civilization are lost in the fighting. So Stokes is directed by the President to assemble an Army unit nicknamed "Monuments Men" that will search for stolen art and return it to its rightful owners. The president warns Stokes that the young art experts are already fighting at war, so Stokes must recuit an army unit of veteran people.
Stokes recuits curator James Granger (Matt Damon), architect Richard Campbell (Bill Murray), art historian Donald Jeffries (Hugh Boneville), french artist Jean-Claude Clemont (Jean Dujardin), art director Preston Savitz (Bob Balaban) and sculptor Walter Garfield (John Goodman).
The unit is assembled in England, there Stokes and Jeffries give a lecture to the team informing them about Hitler's intentions to create the "Führermuseum". Stokes inform the unit that, as known thanks to the secret services, the Nazis must have the stolen art hidden in some den in North France, so the unit must travel to Normandy, occupied now by the Allies, and get into France.
Claire Simone is interrogate by a Nazi officer at her house.
James Granger is set to be the first to arrive at France by the channel, since he has a friend who directed the national musseums in France. So he manages to land on Deuville.
Meanhile in Paris, Claire Simone is interrogated at her house by the Nazi officer Stahl, because Claire's brother, who's part of the resistance, was surprised trying to steal a nazi's truck full of french art objects on its way to Berlin. Stahl suspects Claire has given her brother the information about the truck, so he register Clarie's house in search for clues to arrest her for being a spy. But Stahl doesn't find any evidence to make an arrest and goes out.
In the north of France, Stokes' unit is called by an Allied platoon who has capture some Nazi's soldiers that transported a truck full of paintings. The truck was on his way to the city of Siegen. So the Monuments Men decide to move towards Siegen.
In Paris, The Nazis are leaving the city, but on their way they plunder the private art of the city. The night the Nazis leave Paris, Claire Simone goes back to the Nazi's office were she worked, and discovers that all the private art collected there from french citizens has been taken away by the Nazis.
Granger talks with Claire Simone who's in jail for collaborating with the nazis, even if she was forced to do so.
After a short period of time, Claire is arrested for collaborating with the Nazis and is jailed, but James Granger comes to Paris and, in an attemp to get some information about what might have happened to all the private collections stolen by the nazis, he pursues Claire and goes to the jail she's in.
Granger asks Claire for information, but Claire is cautious about giving him information since she suspects the americans want to confiscate the stolen art for their own country. Granger is confident that Claire worked for the resistance, and he knows she was a spy so he offers her a deal; he will manage to set her free from jail in order to collaborate with him.
Menwhile the Monuments Men's unit manages to get in contact by radio, so they decide to split up to cover more ground to protect some valious art, with varying degrees of success. Stokes goes to Germany while the others split in pairs to Belgium and Germany.
On their way to Belgium, Richard Campbell and Preston Savitz learn that a Belgian panel set of religious artwork (the Van Eyck altarpiece) was removed by the priests of Ghent Cathedral for safekeeping, but their truck was stopped and the panels taken. Eventually, purely by chance, they find and arrest Viktor Stahl, hiding as a farmer, when they identify the paintings in his house as masterpieces, at least one stolen from the Rothschild Collection.
Donald Jeffries of the British Army sneaks into Bruges, Belgium, which is still occupied by the Germans, at night to try to save a statue of the Madonna and Child by Michelangelo. He is killed attempting to stop Colonel Wegner from taking it away.
In Paris, Claire shows Granger a stock full of art objects stolen by the Nazis from french families.
On their wat to Germany, Walter Garfield and Jean Claude Clermont get lost in the country side and blunder into a firefight. Clermont is mortally wounded and dies when Garfield is unable to find medical help.
Meanwhile, at Paris, Claire Simone reconsiders her idea of collaborating with James Granger, and she is set free from jail thanks to him. First, Claire shows Granger a stock in Paris where the Nazis hid art pieces stolen from private collections, mainly from Jewish families.
Granger begins to catalog the art pieces, and he decides to return a painting looted from a Jewish family sent to the death camps to its rightful place in their empty original house. Claire sees this and is moved by Granger's gesture.
Granger shows Claire the Nero Decree signed by Hitler, and she finally decides to cooperate fully with Granger to recover all the art stolen.
Later on, Granger shows Claire a copy of "the Nero Decree" signed by Hitler, which orders the destruction of all German possessions if Hitler dies or Germany falls. After seeing this, Claire finally decides to collaborate fully with Granger and to provide him with all the information she has.
Meanwhile the team is reunited on its way to Germany. And, eventually, they has some success, as they discover, after stealing a map from the Nazis, that the strategy followed by the Nazis is to hide all the art collected in German and Austrian mines.
The team finds at least one mine with over 16,000 art pieces, as well as grotesque finds like barrels of gold teeth extracted from victims of the death camps. In addition, it also captures the entire gold reserves of the Nazi German national treasury.
Claire finally proves Granger with all the information he needs
Back in Paris, Granger and Claire have a date and have dinner at Claire's house. There, Claire provides Granger a comprehensive ledger she has compiled that provides valuable information on the stolen art and the rightful owners. Claire has wrote down and photographed all the Nazi officials that went through the office and were part of the looting of the art objects, she also has a complete register of all the art stolen. And also she tells Granger that this work of art is not hidden into the mines but in a Castle in the Alps.
At the end of the date, Claire offers Granger to spend the night with her, but Granger tells her he's married and decides to leave. However they end up in good terms and being great friends. The next day Granger parts to Germany to be reunited with the rest of his team.
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Finally, the team finds a mine in Austria that appears to have been demolished. However, the team discovers that only the entrances were blocked by the locals in order to prevent the Nazis destroying the contents. The team evacuates as much artwork as possible, including the sculpture Jeffries died trying to defend, before the Soviets arrive to take control of what is to become part of the Soviet zone of occupation.
Stokes reports back to President Truman that the team has recovered vast quantities of artwork and various other culturally significant items. As he requests to stay in Europe to oversee further searching and restoration, Truman asks Stokes if his efforts were worth the lives of the men that he lost. Stokes replies that they were. Truman then asks if, thirty years from now, anyone will remember that these men died for a piece of art.
In 1977, the elderly Stokes (Nick Clooney), replies "Yeah," while he takes his grandson to see Michelangelo's Madonna sculpture.
Cast[]
- George Clooney - Lt. Frank Stokes
- Matt Damon - Lt. James Granger
- John Goodman - Sgt. Walter Garfield
- Bill Murray - Sgt. Richard Campbell
- Hugh Boneville - 2nd Lt. Donald Jeffries
- Cate Blanchett - Claire Simone
- Jean Dujardin - 2nd Lt. Jean-Claude Clermont
- Bob Balaban - Pvt. Preston Savitz
- Sam Hazeldine - Colonel Langton
- Dimitri Leonidas - Pvt. Sam Epstein
Music[]
The soundtrack for the film was composed by Alexander Desplat.
1. The Roosevelt Mission
2. Opening Titles
3. Ghent Altarpiece
4. Champagne
5. Basic Training
6. Normandy
7. Deauville
8. Stokes
9. I See You, Stahl
10. John Wayne
11. Sniper
12. Into Bruges
13. The Letter
14. The Nero Decree
15. Stahl's
16. Jean-Claude Dies
17. Siegen Mine
18. Claire & Granger
19. Gold!
20. Heilbronn Mine
21. Castle Art Hoard
22. Altaussee
23. Finale
24. End Credits
25. Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas - Nora Sagal
Production[]
The Monuments Men is an American-German co-production of Columbia Pictures (in association with 20th Century Fox) and Studio Babelsberg.
The film was funded by the German Federal Film Fund (DFFF) with €8.5 million, Mitteldeutsche Medienförderung, Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg as well as Medien- und Filmgesellschaft Baden-Württemberg. Casting was held in February 2013 for thousands of extras for the military scenes.
Principal photography began in early March 2013 at the Babelsberg Studios in Potsdam, Germany, in the Berlin-Brandenburg region and the Harz. The mines around Bad Grund, particularly the Wiemannsbucht and the Grube Hilfe Gottes were used in the filming of outdoor scenes. Other outdoor locations were the towns of Lautenthal, Clausthal-Zellerfeld, Goslar, Halberstadt and Osterwieck. Some of the scenes, including flights and American war base footage, were filmed at Imperial War Museum Duxford, Cambridgeshire, UK.
Douglas C-47 Skytrain Dakota landing at Duxford Air Field during filming at Imperial War Museum Duxford, England.
Filming was scheduled to last until the end of June 2013, wrapping up in Rye, East Sussex.
Release[]
The cast of "The Monuments Men" at the movie premiere in New York
On October 24, 2013, it was announced that the film would screen on February 7, 2014 at the 64th Berlin International Film Festival.
The film was screened at UNESCO on 27 March 2014, on the occasion of the panel discussion "Modern Day Monuments Men and Women" on the preservation of heritage in times of conflict and the fight against the illicit trafficking of cultural property.
Reception[]
The film received mixed reviews from critics. Rotten Tomatoes gives the film a 31% rating, with an average score of 5.2/10, based on 217 reviews. The site's consensus reads: "Its intentions are noble and its cast is impressive, but neither can compensate for The Monuments Men 's stiffly nostalgic tone and curiously slack narrative." At Metacritic, the film has a score of 52 out of 100, based on 43 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews".
Film critic Peter Travers in Rolling Stone Magazine gave it 3 out of 4 stars, noting that while some of the dialog and emotions seemed inauthentic, the physical production and cinematography was "exquisite," with shooting done on locations in Germany and England. In comparing the film with current ones, he considers it a "proudly untrendy, uncynical movie," where the story involved people seeking something more valuable than money: "Clooney [as director] feels there's much to be learned from these unsung art warriors. . . . What Clooney has crafted in The Monuments Men is a movie about aspiration, about culture at risk, about things worth fighting for. I'd call that timely and well worth a salute."
Historian Alex von Tunzelmann, writing for The Guardian, noted several historical faults and said of the plot, "If you're getting the sense that the film is episodic and poorly structured, unfortunately you'd be right", and "There are far too many characters, so the screenplay splits them up into little groups and sends them off on various errands. Some of these are more exciting than others – but they do not add up to a satisfying plot. A TV series might have been a better vehicle for the "monuments men" stories than a feature film... The story is fascinating, but this film's good intentions are hampered by its lack of pace, direction, tone and properly fleshed-out characters."
In its review, the Spanish tabloid newspaper La Razón cited that the film took its inspiration from "Hollywood war propaganda cinema", and that it shows the tendency of its director towards "historical revisionism".
Due to the Sony Pictures Entertainment hack, it was revealed through several emails that director and star Clooney was upset and apologetic about the reviews the film received, and lost sleep over them.