Given the reading and research you have conducted, how historically accurate and reliable is your chosen example of popular history?
The 2014 film The Monuments Men directed by George Clooney has very little historical accuracy and is not a reliable source for learning about the art stolen by the Nazis during World War II. In the film, seven art historians, museum directors and curators form an army unit named ‘The Monuments Men,’ who set out to retrieve precious art stolen by the Nazis to display in Adolf Hitler’s Fuhrermuseum, and return them to their rightful owners.
One of the main (and most obvious) issues, however, is the fact that Clooney does not appear to be able to settle on a style in which he’d like the film to be in. The film has many confusing moments in which the most tense part of a gripping fight scene switches to a scene of still, quiet Michelangelo admiration, leaving …show more content…
For example, the name ‘The Monuments Men’ was an abbreviation of the MFAA (Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives), which was its official name.
Unlike the film depicts, the Monuments Men never worked together in a group, as there were so many of them. It would have been impossible for 350 men to have worked together in a group, but as the film focuses on only seven Monuments Men, teamwork for them seems a lot more plausible.
The deaths in The Monuments Men were very unlike the deaths of these people in real life. The film depicts Donald Jeffries (Bonneville) sacrificing himself to save Michelangelo’s Madonna of Bruges. This did not happen. Ronald Balfour (who was the man Bonneville’s character was based on) did die, but not as romantically as in the film. He actually died while trying to move a medieval altarpiece to safety, and a shell burst, killing him. There was only one other Monuments Man who
The 2014 film The Monuments Men directed by George Clooney has very little historical accuracy and is not a reliable source for learning about the art stolen by the Nazis during World War II. In the film, seven art historians, museum directors and curators form an army unit named ‘The Monuments Men,’ who set out to retrieve precious art stolen by the Nazis to display in Adolf Hitler’s Fuhrermuseum, and return them to their rightful owners.
One of the main (and most obvious) issues, however, is the fact that Clooney does not appear to be able to settle on a style in which he’d like the film to be in. The film has many confusing moments in which the most tense part of a gripping fight scene switches to a scene of still, quiet Michelangelo admiration, leaving …show more content…
For example, the name ‘The Monuments Men’ was an abbreviation of the MFAA (Monuments, Fine Arts and Archives), which was its official name.
Unlike the film depicts, the Monuments Men never worked together in a group, as there were so many of them. It would have been impossible for 350 men to have worked together in a group, but as the film focuses on only seven Monuments Men, teamwork for them seems a lot more plausible.
The deaths in The Monuments Men were very unlike the deaths of these people in real life. The film depicts Donald Jeffries (Bonneville) sacrificing himself to save Michelangelo’s Madonna of Bruges. This did not happen. Ronald Balfour (who was the man Bonneville’s character was based on) did die, but not as romantically as in the film. He actually died while trying to move a medieval altarpiece to safety, and a shell burst, killing him. There was only one other Monuments Man who