• Producer(s):

    ARTE FRANCE

  • Territories:

    Worldwide.

  • Production year:

    2004

  • Language(s):

    German, French

  • Rights:

    NON-THEATRICAL, TV, DVD, MOBILE

This film considers the question of art and its role in our scheme of values and priorities through the destinies of a few men and works of art. What must we first protect, rescue, rebuild ? Is the protection of works of art a luxury for the richer nations ?

From Paris to Los Angeles via Dresden, Florence, Madagascar, the film will tell us the story of these endangered masterpieces but also of the passionate fight carried on by many obscure protagonists - curators, archivists, firemen or museum attendants - who wish to save them. In 1996, some of them set up the International Committee of the Blue Shield, a cultural equivalent of the Red Cross. Others, in charge of the greatest museums in the world : the Louvre, the Paul Getty Foundation, keep a careful watch over priceless treasures. All of them fight in their own way against time, disasters, men. The French president of the republic has even coined the phrase : cultural crime against humanity. The collapse of the Manhattan twin towers also led to the loss of whole art collections. And yearly, the four natural elements keep on raging against the memory of men : floods, earthquakes, fires, storms.
Do the lesser privileged ones need first-aid archaeologists when they have no water, food or health care ? Is art man's most valuable good ?