VALKYRIE

“VALKYRIE” (Tom Cruise, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson & Kenneth Branagh)

I haven’t decided yet if this is my new #1 film of 08, or if ‘Australia’ should retain the title. When it ended I told my wife – It’s good. It’s really good, but something kept it from being ‘great’... I couldn’t put my finger on it right away, but I’ve concluded that it’s Tom Cruise. The funny thing is – he wasn’t THAT bad. He was the weakest actor of a fantastic ensemble cast, but what bothered me about him - & director Bryan Singer gets the blame for this – is that he is the ONLY member of the cast NOT speaking with a British accent. A whole cast full of English actors playing Nazi’s & one American inserted into the lead role? It became a distraction, even though I was engulfed by the story & the way it played out – even though I knew most of the time what was going to happen next. It COULD have been great – Damn it, it SHOULD have been great & that one unforgivable flaw keeps it from being the unquestionable Best Film of 2008... Pity.
Knowing the story, or even knowing how the story ends, doesn’t necessarily mean I can’t enjoy the ride (I knew the ‘secret’ of ‘The Sixth Sense’ prior to viewing but I loved it anyway) Sean Penn was so outstanding in ‘The Assassination Of Richard Nixon’ that it didn’t matter a lick that I knew he wasn’t going to succeed. I recently watched a History Channel special on the actual Valkyrie conspiracy, so it was easy for me to follow the plot & keep track of all of the Nazi’s speaking with British accents, but my wife, who hadn’t seen the special said she was able to follow the story & characters without much difficulty (Except when she asked which character did Liam Neeson play?)
‘Valkyrie’ as I’m sure you know is how the conspirators of the plot to assassinate Hitler referred to their operation, as the Valkyrie plan was created to tell the Nazi army what to do in case Adolph Hitler was killed. The leaders of the plot were all high ranking Nazi leaders – seeing how close they actually came to pulling it off was fascinating to watch. Realizing that if not for one ‘chicken’ (Tom Wilkinson’s General Fromm) they may have succeeded in taking over Hitler’s army even without disposing of him should have everyone in the world giving Tom a dirty look everywhere he goes for a few years...
The only complaint I have with the screenplay is that they didn’t include more of the previous attempts to show just how determined these conspirators were.
Still, it didn’t matter – even knowing the operation was doomed to fail, I was intrigued by the story from beginning to end. The cast is superb; Bill Nighy as General Olbricht, Kenneth Branagh as Major-General von Tresckow & Terrence Stamp as Ludwig Beck are all to be commended for their work in this film. Even the ‘bit’ part players shined – there wasn’t a bad performance by anyone. It just baffled me that Tom Cruise was told to ‘go ahead & speak in your normal voice’ . . . Would it have worked if he had adopted an English accent? From my past viewing of Cruise’s acting abilities – No (Bleep)ing Way!
Even though Cruise wasn’t bad – he had a couple of memorable scenes (Like when he saluted General Fromm by raising his ‘hand that wasn’t there’ & loudly spouting ‘Heil, Hitler’!) I feel the movie was hampered by allowing him to be the only American Nazi in the party. I thought of other actors that would have worked in the role & came up with Russell Crowe or Viggo Mortenson (We know he can do a Russian accent, English should be a piece of cake)
Although I was surprised to see cross-dressing comedian Eddie Izzard in a supporting role - & he did an okay job - but it would have been an improvement with, say, a Brenden Gleeson in that role.
So what we have is a truly great story, mesmerizing at times, & a poor choice by the director that ruins it & just makes it VERY good... I’ll be interested to hear other opinions on this film – I know Cruise has been lambasted by several critics, but I’d blame Singer, the director as much as the actor for his semi-weak performance.