Review of The Monuments Men (2014) by Jeremiahong1234 — 12 Nov 2014

The story takes place in Europe when the US was an integral part of the allies in during back the Germans in World War II. Frank Stoles, a Lieutenant, was trying to persuade the President of United States, that winning the war will not be completely successful if all of the priceless works of art were destroyed by the Germans. Frank said, “While we must and will win this war, we should also remember the high price that’ll be paid if the very foundation of modern society is destroyed.” The President half-heartedly agreed with Frank’s statement and gave him permission to recruit a handful of people, nicknamed “The Monuments Men”, to support this mission. Frank was able to recruit six other people who were mainly museum curators and art historians. Almost all of them had no previous military experience but all of them were willing to support this mission since they saw the value in recouping all of those invaluable artworks.

The Monuments Men were divided into different groups or individuals to try to track down where the Germans were transporting and storing the artworks.

James Granger went to Paris to understand where the Germans transported all the stolen treasures from France. James was attempting to befriend Claire Simone, a curator in occupied France, who might know the details of the stolen artworks. Claire initially didn’t trust James since she suspected the allies will confiscate all the treasures. But later Claire realized the James returned a stolen art to a Jewish home, and she trusted that James would keep his word and gave him a ledger that contained important information of the stolen art.

Richard Campbell and Preston Savitz tried to figure out a set of stolen Belgian artworks. They were able to identify and arrest a German officer who was healing as a farmer but decorated his home with the stolen artworks.

Walter Garfield and Jean Claude Clermont were on their way to look for the stolen treasures. Unfortunately, they accidentally ran into Germans patrol and Jean Claude were hit and died.

Donald Jeffries went to a Belgian church and was trying to transport the valuable artwork out of the church. However, the Germans came and shot him to death.

With two members died, the Monuments Men came together again as a team with only five members left. They understood that Hitler would want all the artworks to be destroyed if Germany lost the war. He issued the Nero Decree to his military to do that. The team was rushing against time since Germany is faltering. At the same time, the Russians were advancing from the East, and they would confiscate all the artwork in order to help to rebuild their country. The team realized that the Germans were storing most of the art treasures in mines and castles. The team was able to recover substantial amount of artworks from mines and castles in Austria and Germany.

At the conclusion if the war, President Truman asked Frank Stoles whether it was worth for two people’s lives in order to rescue those art. Frank had no doubt and responded back it was all worth it. At the end of the movie, Frank took his grandson to visit Michelangelo's Madonna sculpture.