Tales of stolen art constitute thrill candy for all classes of moviegoers.
Films like “The Thomas Crown Affair” or “Ocean’s 12” play to the populist concept of stealing from the rich – not necessarily to give to the poor, but simply to insult the rich.
Since art theft usually involves little or no violence, and the “victim” is often a dandy or an insurer, we can revel in the audacity of the crime without having to manufacture the rancor of vengeance.
The quirky documentary “Stolen” draws us in with that sense of detached curiosity, reminding us of a distant theft and tantalizing us with potential solutions. That it never quite reaches an “Aha!” moment is the movie’s chief flaw, as we have been set up to expect answers.
On the morning after St. Patrick’s Day in 1990, when much of Boston was sleeping off a green
hangover, burglars posing as city policemen entered the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. They overpowered relatively untrained security guards and spent 90 minutes in the museum, lifting treasured works by Rembrandt, Degas and Manet.
But the most audacious seizing was Vermeer’s “The Concert.” Only 35 paintings by the 16th century Dutch master still exist. Experts consider “The Concert” the most valuable painting ever stolen.
When Rebecca Dreyfus filmed her documentary in 2005, none of the stolen paintings had been recovered. That mystery is the tantalizing tableaux “Stolen” consciously evokes, of a remote castle where an evil baron in cravat and smoking jacket gazes upon his ill-gotten masterpieces in decadent bliss.
The charm of Dreyfus’ approach, and the draw of her main subjects, is how personally everyone takes the crime. Gardner is a beloved figure in Boston. She amassed her wondrous collection and commissioned a building for it that reflected her eccentricities.
Journalist Tom Mashberg calls the theft “rude,” admitting his own obsession with the facts when the Boston Herald assigned him to the story in the 1990s.
The main character in “Stolen,” though, is an old man in a bowler hat straight out of a Magritte painting. Harold Smith was a private art investigator who solved many crimes on behalf of insurance companies and art institutions. He follows the Gardner heist as a personal quest and helps promote interest in the $5 million reward.
The aging Smith suffers terribly from skin cancer, a result of military medical experiments that involved lanolin and an ultraviolet lamp – don’t ask, it’s better to handle the mess with Smith’s cheerful, gentlemanly aplomb. Smith interviews various shady characters claiming knowledge of the Gardner paintings with his face and hands covered in bandages, the ravages of cancer never erasing his courtly manners.
Like everyone else with knowledge of the case, Dreyfus would like to solve it herself. Failing that, she makes the movie feel a bit padded by having actors Campbell Scott and Blythe Danner read 19th-century letters between Gardner and her procurement agent in Europe.
Still, Dreyfus explores the nuances of the case and the paintings with admirable enthusiasm. “The Concert” itself comes under scrutiny, heightening our appreciation of Vermeer and his luminous genius.
Various informants launch an on-camera dialogue with federal prosecutors as to the meaning of justice: If they could produce the paintings, would these illicit brokers receive immunity from prosecution? What constitutes the greater good, putting criminals in jail or recovering incomparable paintings?
Yes, your curiosity will be piqued. For images of the missing paintings and information on the investigation and the reward, go to www.find-the-art.com. And check your closet for any stray Vermeers.
Staff writer Michael Booth can be reached at 303-820-1686 or mbooth@denverpost.com.
“Stolen” | ** RATING
NOT RATED|1 hour, 25 minutes| DOCUMENTARY|Directed by Rebecca Dreyfus; featuring art investigator Harold Smith and other real-life characters surrounding a 1990 Boston art heist|Opens today at Starz FilmCenter at the Tivoli.
