Joining The Monuments Men

Good day my friends I hope you all had a great week last week and weekend! As for me the one thing that I look forward to is the new releases that come out on Friday's. While there was a few to choose from this week, I had to think about just what I wanted to see for this weeks review. But eventually it came to me and I chose to see the movie The Monuments Men which was written and directed by George Clooney. Now not only does George Clooney( Oceans 11) write and direct this movie but he also stars in it as well as Frank Stokes. This movie also features his Oceans 11-13 counterpart Matt Damon(The Bourne Identity) as James Granger. Rounding out the cast is Bill Murray( Lost In Translation) as Richard Campbell, John Goodman( Argo) as Walter Garfield, Jean Dujardin( Academy ward winner Best Actor for The Artist) as Jean Claude Clermont and Cate Blanchett( The Aviator) as Claire Simone. So lets get ready to be transported to another time on the big screen as the lights go down and we sit eating a big bag of popcorn.



It's 1943 and World War 2 is raging on in Europe, the Nazis are still occupying Paris. But they also have been taking many rare paintings and sculptures and storing them away somewhere. But Frank Stokes(Clooney) see's that many of these artworks are either being destroyed or stolen by the Nazis he convinces the President to put a team together to help preserve these artworks and return the stolen artwork to their owners. This special unit of the army came to be known as the monuments men, those to be recruited in this unit are architects, painters and sculptors. Stokes recruits his friend a curator at the Met in New York Richard Campbell( Damon) and together they recruit the rest of their team. But before they can go on their assignment they must go through basic training first.Well after all is said and done with the team going through basic training the year is now 1944 and the Allies have taken Normandy, also Paris has been reclaimed. The monuments men begin their job to locate and preserve the art and return it to safety to its rightful owners. But in doing this they find out so much more as they discover that Hitler has stolen huge amounts of famous artwork and has it hidden away with plans to build his own museum once the the war is over. But if he was to be killed and Germany falls than his army has orders to destroy it all. With the help of cataloguer at a Paris museum named Claire Simone(Blanchett) and the capture of a German officer they discover where the largest collection of stolen artwork is hidden and must find it before the war is over and destroyed by the Nazis or lost forever as spoils of war by the Russians.




Now while this movie is about to end here right away I guess we should get to finding out what I thought of this movie. So here goes, I thought this movie was interesting. Call me crazy but I am a bit of a history nut and while this movie is based on actual events I did find the historical references I intriguing. Now another thing I enjoy is a movie based on a true story but I did find that at points in this movie it seemed to be a little slow at times. I did enjoy some of the humour put into the movie and the chemistry between the actors particularly between Bill Murray and Bob Balaban. And while Clooney and Damon do have a unique chemistry which was evident in this movie as in others I found Clooney's acting to be a little flat. The rest of the actors gave decent performances  but I did feel the dialogue could have been a little stronger as well as the script itself. But as the movie progressed it did seem to improve.


Well now that I have given you my opinion on the movie I guess you are wanting the final rating of the movie. So I guess I won't keep you waiting with this and get right down to it here in a second or two. After thinking long ad hard about this while coming home from the movie and sitting here and writing this review for you I have come up with a decision. And that decision is this I am going to give The Monuments Men a 7.0 on The Justin Scale Of Movies which just barely makes it into the Pick-It pile of movies to see in the theatre. And with the fact that the movie seemed to save itself towards the end is what pushed it over into that category.

I see the lights are going up here in the theatre, people are putting on their coats & walking out and of course the credits are rolling.So before the attendants come in here to clean up the theatre we are going to call it a wrap on this latest review. Until next time my friends Good Morning, Good Afternoon, Good Evening and as always Good Viewing. I will see you next time at the movies!

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