The movie I chose to review is “Women in Gold”. It was directed by Simon Curtis. In this movie, Helen Mirren plays a role in an older Jewish woman named “Maria Altmann”. Sixty years later after she fled Vienna and left her parents behind but to escape the Nazis. Later Maria starts her legal battles to get back a very valuable painting to her that was stolen by the Nazis. She really loved that painting because it was a painting of her aunt, whom she adored a whole lot, and that painting was then in the possession of a museum in Austria.
A young lawyer named Randy Schoenberg helps Maria in her fight that received a refusal from the Austrian establishment. The whole fight forced Maria to finally confront her past. She remembers her family but also remembers events. WWII has a ton of stories for cinemas to make, they will never run out of WWII materials to make out for the world.
This specific film tackles the fact that thousands of artworks and paintings that were stolen by Nazis have yet to this day never been returned to their rightful owners. Maria’s story is just one of the thousands of stories from families that never were given back what was rightfully theirs and I think it’s incredible that “Woman In Gold” basically said that sometimes we need to leave the past where it belongs but when the past committed a great deal of injustice on a person, one cannot just easily let it go and simply use the pasta as an excuse to not go after justice.
It’s obvious that Maria carries certain guilt carried all these years the guilt that she blames herself for abandoning her family at such a rough time and abandoning their valuables and their home. The actress playing as Maria is incredibly great at presenting us this tortured conflicted human caught between being haunted by the past and the crazy desperate need to forget and move on with her life. While Ryan Reynolds holds his act as the young persistent lawyer. I personally think people don’t give Ryan enough credit because he’s a nice man, but the man can pass as a struggling family man with strong conviction. I think that “Woman In Gold” is an important film, unfortunately, I don’t think that it would be remembered during an award season mainly because we’re still fresh from another Weinstein Company’s drama, ‘Philomena’ a couple of years ago which also showed a similar story of an elderly woman followed by a young lad, both on a path for the truth.
“Woman in Gold” is made to be not against but show the historical background of what happened to Austrian Jews, focuses on both their lives and their personal property when Hitler destroyed the country in the month of March year 1938. Many things happened to jews because of Hitler. The Jewish businesses were shut down and also they were taken and shipped to concentration camps and their possessions were taken by the Third Reich. Throughout the film, we see an emotional flashback to Maria’s story, the sad and very dark days leading up to Hitler’s coming in their country.
Before those bad events, Maria’s family was the most known of Viennese culture. They were a loving and very affectionate and artistic family. With her father being a very known musician and a collector of many of fine art. In her final scene where she sees for the last time with her parents before both her and her husband escape Vienna, Maria hears her father relate the strengths of their family. He said a lot to Maria in order for her to make the decision to leave. “We worked hard,” her father says, “We contributed to society and We belonged, I’m proud of what we have done, and I’m proud of my children.” he says, “As you go, I ask you only one thing, Remember us.” Those was the last words from her father to her. Maria does remember over again memories of the people and the land she was forced to leave behind her but for her own good. The memories are so strong that in fact, they make it difficult for her to even consider going back to Vienna when the time comes for her and Randy to do so, to be able to fight the case. Randy talks to her to encourage her to face her past and its hard moments and so Maria does so. She finally decides to go with Randy and fight the case. Maria tells Randy “I have to do what I can to keep these memories alive. Because people forget, you see. Especially the young.”
There’s another reason for her pursuing the painting is justice and that reason is also taken into the film. Randy in his part was at first only motivated by the thought of getting the multimillion-dollar painting for Maria but he then slowly starts to realize that being selfish is a terrible thing. He then also begins to identify with the situation of his Austrian ancestors and he then breaks down and cries after visiting the Viennese Holocaust memorial. He eventually is motivated simply by justice and is determined in returning the portrait of Adele to its owner which is Maria. He connects with Maria emotionally.
Overall this movie is a great movie not only to understand someone’s past and why it is important to fight for what you believe. Also to gain justice for once ancestors and once self. This movie has many aspects to view it from. It goes from history to love to art to law, it’s a wonderful movie to watch and it’s very easy to be entertained by. I would one hundred percent recommend it.
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