Clooney Film Conundrum

A-list actors can't save George Clooney's scattershot Monuments Men

It’s hard to get a good read on George Clooney as a filmmaker. His five films, including his latest, The Monuments Men, have vacillated between drama and comedy and have touched on everything from television history to football to politics to war. If he has a filmmaking lane, he has yet to stay in it.

Maybe that’s why The Monuments Men feels so scattershot. Based on a true story, it follows an international group of art historians and scholars who dedicated themselves to saving millions of pieces of art from being stolen or destroyed by the Nazis during World War II.

If George Clooney has a filmmaking lane, he has yet to stay in it.

That group includes five Americans (played by Clooney, Matt Damon, Bill Murray, John Goodman and Bob Balaban), one Brit (Hugh Bonneville) and one Frenchman (Jean Dujardin). Although the various militaries approve of the task force, they’re given little official help along the way, forcing them to make their way across Europe on will and wits.

The film’s first issue is tone. Clooney and co-writer Grant Heslov seem like they’re trying to make both a lighthearted caper film — à la Ocean’s Eleven — and one that acknowledges the seriousness of war. Although comedy and drama can work together, one needs to take precedence over the other. Here, it’s more of a 50/50 affair, so the audience can never truly invest in either one.

Because much of the film has a light tone, the stakes never seem all that high. Instead, the seven seem to breeze through their travels with barely a hiccup. Their quest took nearly two years, but Clooney hardly bothers with relaying this passage of time.

Also problematic is the forced separation of many of the characters for large chunks of the two-hour running time. Although it’s a result of the story, it’s a waste to bring together a group of A-list actors who never get the opportunity to play off each other.

If the film does have a saving grace, it is that group of actors. They, along with Cate Blanchett as a Frenchwoman who helps the group’s cause, are a pleasure to watch throughout. The story as it is depicted may not live up to their talent, but it’s not for a lack of effort on their part.

The Monuments Men was originally scheduled to come out in time for Oscars consideration, but it’s clear that it was never that kind of movie. Instead, it’s an unfocused work that feels like it should be way more important than it actually is.

Matt Damon and Cate Blanchett in The Monuments Men.

The Monuments Men

Photo by Claudette Barius

Matt Damon and Cate Blanchett in The Monuments Men.

Wicked News

Wizard of Oz ruby slippers bought by mystery bidder for $28 million

Ruby slippers

Heritage Auctions

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A pair of iconic ruby slippers that were worn by Judy Garland in The Wizard of Oz and stolen from a museum nearly two decades ago sold for a winning bid of $28 million at auction on December 7.

Dallas-based Heritage Auctions had estimated that they would fetch $3 million or more, but the fast-paced bidding far outpaced that amount within seconds and tripled it within minutes. A few bidders making offers by phone volleyed back and forth for 15 minutes as the price climbed to the final, eye-popping sum.

Including the auction house fee, the unknown buyer will ultimately pay $32.5 million.

Online bidding, which opened last month, had stood at $1.55 million before live bidding began late Saturday afternoon.

The sparkly red heels were on display at the Judy Garland Museum in her hometown of Grand Rapids, Minnesota, in 2005 when Terry Jon Martin used a hammer to smash the glass of the museum’s door and display case. Their whereabouts remained a mystery until the FBI recovered them in 2018.

Martin, now 77, who lives near Grand Rapids in northern Minnesota, wasn’t publicly exposed as the thief until he was indicted in May 2023. He pleaded guilty in October 2023. He was in a wheelchair and on supplementary oxygen when he was sentenced last January to time served because of his poor health.

The shoes were returned in February to memorabilia collector Michael Shaw, who had loaned them to the museum. They were one of several pairs that Garland wore during the filming, but only four pairs are known to have survived. In the movie, to return from Oz to Kansas, Dorothy had to click her heels three times and repeat, “There’s no place like home.”

As Rhys Thomas, author of The Ruby Slippers of Oz, put it, the sequined shoes from the beloved 1939 musical have seen “more twists and turns than the Yellow Brick Road.”

Over 800 people had been tracking the slippers, and the company’s webpage for the auction had hit nearly 43,000 page views by Thursday, said Robert Wilonsky, a vice president with the auction house.

Among those bidding to bring the slippers home was the Judy Garland Museum, which posted on Facebook shortly after that it did not place the winning bid. The museum had campaigned for donations to supplement money raised by the city of Grand Rapids at its annual Judy Garland festival and the $100,000 set aside this year by Minnesota lawmakers to help the museum purchase the slippers.

After the slippers sold, the auctioneer told bidders and spectators in the room and watching online that the previous record for a piece of entertainment memorabilia was $5.52 million, for the white dress Marilyn Monroe famously wore atop a windy subway grate.

The auction also included other memorabilia from The Wizard of Oz, such as a hat worn by Margaret Hamilton, who played the original Wicked Witch of the West. That item went for $2.4 million, or a total final cost to the buyer of $2.93 million.

The Wizard of Oz story has gained new attention in recent weeks with the release of the movieWicked, an adaptation of the megahit Broadway musical, a prequel of sorts that reimagines the character of the Wicked Witch of the West.

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