First Look At George Clooney’s The Monuments Men

George Clooney’s upcoming WWII set drama The Monuments Men is shaping up to be a top contender come awards season. Starring Clooney, alongside John Goodman, Matt Damon, Bill Murray, Jean Dujardin and others, the film is currently shooting for a December 18th, 2013 release.

Unfortunately, we haven’t seen anything in the form of promotional material for the flick so far, which is surprising. We’ve actually began to wonder where the trailers, images, posters etc. were. Luckily, today, we finally get our first official look (some photos were leaked a while back) at the film in the form of some stills from EW and USA Today.

There’s nothing too crazy to marvel at here but we get a good, solid look at the phenomenal cast that Clooney has lined up as well as a look at the production design that is bringing the period setting to life. It’s all very much in line with how we’d expect the film to appear and though it’s nothing particularly ground-breaking, it’s still good to finally see some photos from the highly-anticipated project.

After giving us films like The Ides of March and Good Night, and Good Luck, I’m fully on board with Clooney as a director and will watch anything he makes. He doesn’t always hit it out of the park (Leatherheads), but most of his films have at least a couple things to like in them and when he does hit a home run, he really wows us. With the cast he’s assembled here, and a plot that sounds like a ton of fun, I’m eagerly anticipating Clooney’s next sure-to-be awards darling.

Check out the image and plot summary below and let us know what you think of The Monuments Men in the comments section.

Based on the true story of the greatest treasure hunt in history, The Monuments Men is an action-thriller focusing on an unlikely World War II platoon, tasked by FDR with going into Germany to rescue artistic masterpieces from Nazi thieves and returning them to their rightful owners. It would be an impossible mission: with the art trapped behind enemy lines, and with the German army under orders to destroy everything as the Reich fell, how could these guys – seven museum directors, curators, and art historians, all more familiar with Michelangelo than the M-1 – possibly hope to succeed? But as the Monuments Men, as they were called, found themselves in a race against time to avoid the destruction of 1000 years of culture, they would risk their lives to protect and defend mankind’s greatest achievements.