Woman in Gold is a captivating true story about one of the most famous and recent examples of art restitution. It is historically accurate in the representation of the Nazi occupation of Austria and Maria Altmann’s (played by Helen Mirren) eventual recovery of her family’s paintings. Historical accuracy is important when the movie is based on a true story.
Woman in Gold sticks to Maria Altmann’s story. The chronological events of Austria’s Nazi occupation and Mrs. Altmann’s escape, to her decade long battle with the Austrian government. The Austrian Government and the Austrian Gallery in the Belvedere Palace were understanding of their former Nazi occupation and were looking to right the wrongs of the past by holding an art restitution hearing to decide if the paintings that were stolen by the Nazis and then by the Belvedere Gallery should be returned to their owners. This art is obviously stolen but the moving stories told by those in attendance resulted in no returns of art from the gallery back to
the Austrian people.
Art theft is highly underrated in importance. The Nazis occupied all of Germany, half of France, Austria, Norway, Greece, Netherlands, Czechoslovakia, etc. They had a massive land area to confiscate and destroy the personal effects of those whose countries became occupied by Germany. This movie only shows one instance of one woman’s struggle to retrieve her belongings, but before the end credits, they mention that over 100,000 paintings have still not been returned more than fifty years after the fall of Nazi Germany. This is valuable to the viewer because the most that is taught about World War II is how the Nazis were evil and unjust but none of their other less heinous crimes are brought to light. People focus on the murder of the Jews, but what about the theft? This is a tragedy that should be seen and heard about. There are just as many people who fled and lost pieces of their heritage. For example, one of the other characters told us about her family’s home, and how every wall was filled with paintings. Maria Altmann’s main point at the art restitution hearing was that as others see a grand painting, she sees her aunt, and that is something no one else can claim.
The movie is based on the Stealing Klimt documentary where they interview Maria Altmann. It goes through her life in Vienna and her escape, to her work in recovering the five stolen Klimt paintings. Randol Schoenberg (played by Ryan Reynolds) and Hubertus Czernin (played by Daniel Brühl) were the lawyer and Austrian journalist that helped provide and compile Maria Altmann’s evidence to make her case to retrieve her paintings from the Belvedere Gallery. The movie contains and utilizes all the elements of the documentary and even provides a thank you in the end credits to the Stealing Klimt documentary for providing all the background information and personal interviews that assisted in the making of the movie.
Though this is an art historical movie the artist himself is only shown briefly. We see during the opening credits Klimt manipulating a piece of gold leaf for his portrait of one of his models Adele Bloch-Bauer. Klimt himself was a very famous painter in Austria. So, when Maria Altmann comes asking for her aunts’ portrait, they claim that it is the Mona Lisa of
Austria. This is due to Klimt’s fame and the paintings mysterious roots. We know who the Woman in Gold painting is of now, but in the Belvedere Gallery at the time when the Nazis took the painting, they couldn’t disclose who she was since Adele Bloch-Bauer herself and family were Jewish. Just like the Mona Lisa in the Louvre in Paris, France the people who came to view a famous artist’s work were drawn in by the mystery of who this woman was. Therefore, on the political side, this panting marks an important part of Austria’s past and is regarded very highly. So, despite Maria Altmann’s roots and proof that this portrait is of her aunt the Austrian Government and more importantly, the gallery cannot afford to give up such a famous part of Austrian history.
This movie is deliberately highlighting the contrast between political versus personal meaning in artworks. Besides the Belvedere Gallery not being able to relinquish such a prevalent work of art, the younger generation also had their own thoughts about this art restitution hearing and the events of the Holocaust. In the movie, Maria Altmann is leaving the building after the art restitution hearings and is confronted by a man. He comments on how “she gave a moving speech”, but that “not everything is about the Holocaust”, and that “people like her never give up do they?”. This shows that the Austrian public views these works as a part of Austria now and no longer part of a personal collection or of a family member in this case. Klimt’s fame as an Austrian artist made this artwork a staple of the Belvedere Gallery’s collection and resonated with the younger generation of Austria. This left Maria Altmann questioning whether it was worth it to get her aunt’s portrait and other paintings back. All this back and forth about what is right for the sake of the Belvedere Gallery or for Maria Altmann leaves the viewer to think about their own moral compass. Whether the viewer sides with the political or the personal, the viewer must see what they think is right. There are many descendants of those who survived the Holocaust who could influence whether you as a viewer think what Maria Altmann is pursuing is worth it.
Woman in Gold overall is extremely powerful and will resonate with everyone. It challenges your beliefs and brings to light the prevalence and need for art restitution following the Nazi occupation of many other countries.
