Woman in Gold raises questions the director probably didn't intend

Woman in Gold is based on the true story of Maria Altmann, a Jewish woman who in 1999 at age 83 sued the Austrian government to recover artwork stolen from her family by the Nazis more than 60 years earlier. Although the movie’s finale is never in doubt, Woman in Gold leaves moviegoers with more questions than answers.

Austrian painter Gustav Klimt’s depiction of Adele Bloch-Bauer in oil and gold on canvas used to hang above the sofa in the living room of the Bloch-Bauer residence. “I see my aunt, a woman who taught me about life and brushed my hair,” Maria (Helen Mirren) tells an Austrian journalist (Daniel Brühl) who befriends Maria and her inexperienced American lawyer, Randol Schoenberg (Ryan Reynolds). But the family’s wall ornament became a country’s national treasure. “She is the Mona Lisa of Austria,” the journalist warns. “Do you think they’ll just let her go?” The Austrian government obstructs Maria’s efforts to reclaim Adele Bloch-Bauer I, confiscated by the Nazis and later put on display in a national gallery, and other Klimt pieces Maria’s childless uncle had willed to his nephews and nieces.

Woman in Gold (rated PG-13 for thematic elements and brief strong language) alternates between the years prior to World War II and the years after Austria’s new art restitution laws opened the door to greater transparency into the country’s Nazi past. No Grisham-told tale, the film’s judicial scenes—the initial rejection by an Austrian panel, arguments before the United States Supreme Court to allow a lawsuit against Austria to go forward, and the final arbitration hearing in Austria—play out on screen as mundanely as they probably did in real life.

Modern moviegoers, raised on rich cinematic narratives (The Pianist, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas, and others) of Holocaust survivors who lost entire families to continent-wide cruelty, may find it difficult to care about a wealthy woman’s stolen paintings—even if Adele Bloch-Bauer I did sell at auction in 2006 for $135 million.

The underdeveloped side stories—8-year-old Maria’s moments with her aunt and Randol’s relationship with his stay-at-home wife (Katie Holmes)—do not provide much empathy for Maria or her struggling attorney. The only drama comes from the handful of scenes in which the Nazis strip the Bloch-Bauer home of its objets d’art as the family looks on and as soldiers pursue young Maria (Tatiana Maslany) and her new husband Fritz (Max Irons) through the streets of Vienna.

Although much of Woman in Gold is hurried and impassive (except for Randol’s one, brief profanity-laden outburst, every character seems to be the model of self-composure), difficult questions—perhaps ones not intended by the director—emerge: How long should a community be responsible for the actions of its former members? Can a nation with no objective moral guide truly repent of its sins, or is it destined to recycle hatred and violence? Is two square meters of paint worth a sum that could support more than 16,000 Compassion International children for 18 years? These are matters worth discussing because, as Maria says, “People forget, especially the young.”