Movie Review: Woman in Gold

Film paints picture of horror and future hope

Movie Review: Woman in Gold

Reviewer: Chloe Vellinga

Rated: M

Rating: 8.5/10

When an octogenarian Jewish refugee teams up with a young, inexperienced lawyer, the partnership between the two is bound to have generational faults.

As one of the most respected actresses in the world, Helen Mirren’s delivery of her character Maria Altmann in Woman in Gold is, quite simply, unforgettable.

With a young ‘schoolboy’ in tow, Altmann takes on the Goliath that is the Austrian Government for what she believes is rightfully hers.

Family friend and lawyer Randol Schoenberg (Ryan Reynolds) has just started a new job and is persuaded by his mother to help Altmann with her journey to bring back justice for her war-stricken family – the return of the world-famous painting of her aunt Adele Bloch-Bauer, the woman in gold.

Juggling his family life and the hard task ahead, Schoenberg soon becomes obsessed with the case – staying up until all hours of the night researching Austrian law and trying to find a loophole in the complicated case.

For Schoenberg, at first the case is all about the money upon realising exactly how much the painting is worth.

But throughout the journey he sees the discomfort and hate Altmann has for the Nazis and all that they took from her.

For Altmann, all she really wants is to restore justice in her life in memory of her sister, who recently died, but also for the family she left behind in Austria when she fled.

Filled with flashbacks, this film took me right back to the time when I travelled to Germany and saw the utter devastation and heartache the Nazis bestowed on the Jews and the rest of the world.

The fear and apprehension in Altmann’s eyes from her earlier life was brilliantly captured in showing the terrifying decision to either stay and protect her mother and father or flee to America, where she knew a safe life would be ahead of her.

I hope Woman in Gold is remembered come the next awards season for its excellent delivery, breathtaking flashbacks and exceptional casting.

Walking out of the cinema, I had no words – just utter disbelief at how so many had suffered torment at the hands of the Nazis but also the sense of just how lucky we really are today.