Review: The Monuments Men

by Trevor Kirkendall

★½

George Clooney leads the Monuments Men

“The Monuments Men” tells the story of a little know episode in world history. During the Nazi occupation of many Western European countries, Hitler had ordered private collections of renowned artwork to be taken and delivered to Germany. His goal was to assemble a vast collection of art in his own museum (the Fuhrer Museum, as it was to be called). Art historian Frank Stokes (George Clooney) wants to make sure this does not happen. He proposes an idea to President Roosevelt to go into Europe and retrieve these works of art from the Nazis and return then to their rightful homes. Roosevelt agrees, but doesn’t think they’ll be able to spare any of their troops to do this, so he tells Stokes to assemble a team and do the mission himself.

Stokes gathers some men together, which he calls the Monuments Men. He takes James Granger (Matt Damon), a renowned museum curator, Richard Campbell (Bill Murray), an architect, Walter Garfield (John Goodman), a sculptor, Preston Savitz (Bob Balaban), an art collector, and two Europeans – Brit Donald Jeffries (Hugh Bonneville) and Frenchman Jean Claude Clermont (Jean Dujardin). They arrive in Normandy about a month after the Allied invasion and get to work finding the stolen art.

Granger heads to the recently liberated Paris to find a contact he knows about. He’s then directed to Claire Simone (Cate Blanchett) who worked in the museums during the Nazi occupation. She wants to have the stolen art recovered, but doesn’t trust Granger or the Americans to hand the art back over to the French people. The Russians have assembled a similar group to recover stolen art as well; only they’re not giving it back. Simone thinks this will be what the Americans end up doing.

As for the rest of the team, everyone splits up and goes to various cities and towns around France and neighboring countries looking for stolen art. Two pieces they have a particularly high interest in recovering are the Ghent Altarpiece and the Madonna of Bruges sculpture by Michelangelo. With the war’s end in sight, Hitler has ordered everything stolen by his Nazi party to be destroyed in the event of Germany’s fall or his death. It’s a race against time for the Monuments Men to find where the Nazis have hidden all these works of art before everything is destroyed.

“The Monuments Men” is a compelling story, one that most history books seem to omit. However, the film’s telling of the story is a giant mess that completely falls flat on itself. It doesn’t know whether it wants to be a lighthearted affair or if wants to be some kind of well meaning historical drama. It’s confusing, not because of the plot, but because you never really know what kind of movie you’re watching. Should you laugh or be moved to tears? There’s nothing wrong with sprinkling a little bit of humor to break up the seriousness, but this film isn’t like that.

What's so funny, gentlemen?

The only person who can be held accountable for this is writer-director George Clooney. He had a chance to take a very little know episode from history and make a poignant and memorable film. Instead, the tone of the film feels like it reflects Clooney’s mood on any given day when they were filming. If he woke up happy, the film takes on the lighthearted feel. If he woke up on the wrong side of the bed, there’s a definite somber tone to the scenes. It’s that kind schizophrenic and the mood shifts that quickly. And Clooney’s cho ?ice of music helps to emphasize this even further. Alexandre Desplat’s score goes from melancholy string arrangements to upbeat “F Troop” style military marches. Happy or sad? The music certainly doesn’t help with the tone.

Clooney’s screenplay, co-written with his usual producing partner Grant Heslov, lacks focus and depth. There’s no primary plot line running through here, only subplots. And each subplot shares the same ultimate goal: find the art. These guys all split up when they get to Europe and the screenplay dedicates equal amounts of time following them around. There’s very little opportunity for anyone to become invested in these characters. When tragedy strikes, the group is understandably upset. But not the audience. Why should we care? We know they’re professionals in the study of art, but outside of that they’re nothing more than famous faces reciting lines and moving about the set. I had to keep reminding myself that Clooney and Heslov – the men who wrote and produced this film – are the same guys who gave us “Good Night and Good Luck” and “Argo”. It’s a pretty spectacular failure.

The only good moments in the entire film are when Cate
Blanchett is on camera.

A cast of such talented stars can’t even save the script. Clooney once again strolls through the set of his film looking like Dr. Ross with a moustache and a military coat. He still can’t seem to get rid of that little head bobble he does in practically every role. Damon looks lost in every scene, maybe because Blanchett, with whom he shares many scenes, intimidates him with her acting abilities. Blanchett is the one bright spot in the entire film. Goodman and Murray look unsure of themselves. Should they be funny or not? Both play drama very well, but they don’t seem to know which direction to take. And Murray walking around with a weapon over his shoulder accompanied by Desplat’s comedic military marches feels more like a 30-plus-year follow up to “Stripes” than a serious drama set in WWII. And Dujardin flashes his million dollar smile looking like George Valentin from his Oscar-winning turn in “The Artist”. It almost looks like Clooney gathered his friends in one big room, handed them a script and turned them loose without giving them any type of direction.

Yes, “The Monuments Men” had all the makings of a good film, but it falls completely flat. This looks more like an inexperienced filmmaker’s first feature, not a seasoned Oscar winner’s fifth. The story is solid and Clooney was right to try and bring this to the public’s attention. As a student of history at one point in my life, I was completely unaware that this ever happened. It seems like a lot of filmmakers want to tell the true tales of little known moments in history. But the problem is they try to do too much in these films and everything seems to be overwhelming. In the end, the logline of this film is really the only story you need to know.

I was a little surprised to see the studio pull this film from its original Christmas 2013 release. I thought that they were intimidated by such a crowded awards field that they would have a better chance taking home Oscars in 2014. But then they scheduled it to open in February, which is not a very great month to open movies, especially if you’re looking for awards. Now I know the move wasn’t to contend for awards. The movie is not all that great and didn’t deserve the prestige spotlight they had originally set aside for it. The first four paragraphs of this review are really all you need to know about this story. And forget the awards. The only thing Clooney has to worry about is redeeming himself on his next film to prove he really is a competent and that his work on “Good Night and Good Luck” wasn’t beginners luck. It really is starting to look like that now.