Mona Lisa Is Missing

In 1911, Leonardo da Vinci's Mona Lisa was stolen from the Louvre in Paris and would remain unseen for two years while police fruitlessly searched for it. Vincenzo Peruggia, an Italian expatriate working in France, was eventually arrested when he tried to sell the painting to an art dealer in Florence. Tried and convicted of the theft, Peruggia only served a few months in jail, ultimately returning to France, where he started a family. In Mona Lisa Is Missing, filmmaker Joe Medeiros—a TV writer who became fascinated with the case decades ago—tries to resolve lingering questions. Was Peruggia the real perpetrator? What were his motives? Did he have accomplices? The film follows Medeiros and his long-suffering wife as they traipse through Italy and France searching for clues, with Joe amiably commenting on the progress of the investigation like a standup comedian doing a routine. The most poignant part of the journey involves the Medeiros' visits with Peruggia's 84-year-old daughter, who barely knew her father but continues to revere him as an Italian patriot who sought to return the painting to its native land. Medeiros builds a persuasive case for the conclusion that he comes to in this genial combination of travelogue and detective story that also looks at how the theft turned the Mona Lisa into the world's most famous painting. Recommended. (F. Swietek)