Film Review: The Monuments Men

The Monuments Men. Rated M (violence). 118 minutes. Directed by George Clooney. Screenplay by George Clooney and Grant Heslov. Based on the book by Robert M. Edsel.

Verdict: Self-indulgence on a monumental scale.

Based on the real-life exploits of the officers and civilians who made up the Monuments, Fine Arts, and Archives program (established to locate and return the millions of valuable artworks and artefacts that had been stolen by the Nazis), Clooney and Heslov’s screenplay barely skims the surface of what must have been at stake for these people during dangerous and difficult times.

Despite James Bissell’s (ET the Extra-Terrestrial, Good Night, and Good Luck) meticulous production design (or perhaps because of it), The Monuments Men resembles an over-produced episode of Hogan’s Heroes, as Clooney and Matt Damon, with support from John Goodman, Bill Murray and The Artist’s Jean Dujardin, stroll through the action, barely managing to alter their facial expressions or register a single degree of difficulty.

The result is also often quite funny, as though Clooney and Co have chosen to play it mostly for laughs, which is not only incredibly disconcerting given the subject matter, but also somewhat disrespectful to the honour and the memory of the men and women whose stories they borrow.

Even if Clooney and Heslov do not appear to have been terribly concerned about the fact that there were also women involved in the program, the film boasts a fine performance from Cate Blanchett as French art curator Claire Simone, a witness to the massive art theft the group are charged with retrieving.

Hugh Bonneville (Downtown Abbey) is also excellent as Donald Jeffries, whose passion and dedication to protect Michelangelo’s Madonna of Bruges from the thieving Nazis, provides the film with its only moments of genuine and deeply-moving drama. And yes, the elderly man in the final scene is George Clooney’s Dad. How nice.

This review was commissioned by the West Australian Newspaper Group.