Movie Review: Tom Cruise Stars in Valkyrie

In Valkyrie, Tom Cruise temporarily puts his role of father, religious savior and enthusiastic couch-jumper aside to portray Colonel Stauffenberg -- a smug, aesthetically-challenged renegade soldier who seeks to bring Hitler's reign to an end. After losing an eye, a hand, and two fingers in an ambush, Stauffenberg is recruited by a circle of military leaders to ultimately lead a plan to assassinate the Furher and secure the futures of his wife, children and the German people.

Based on true events, the film follows a group of revolutionaries hoping to win their cause by initiating Operation: Valkyrie -- an emergency action plan set in place by the German government to transfer power to a number of predetermined individuals in the event of Hitler's demise. After gaining approval to amend the operation's verbage to suit his own agenda, Stauffenberg aims to personally eliminate Hitler and devise a conspiracy in which the SS is believed to have been staging a coup d'etat. After the SS is pegged for planning the coup, the door will be open to have them arrested by military reserves. With the SS and Gestapo out of the way, Stauffenberg and his cronies will then have the ability to insert a new Chancellor, bringing an end to Nazi Germany.

While the premise of the film is indeed interesting and entertaining, Cruise's abhorrent (over)acting is a significant drawback. After each line, you are almost expecting him to slowly remove a pair of sunglasses while the Who blares through your television. In fact, I think at one point in the movie, I may have heard director Bryan Singer sternly whisper, "Psst! Act! Act!". A nice surprise, however, was a small role by British comedian Eddie Izzard as General Erich Fellgiebel. While Izzard is not primarily known for his dramatic acting, he does quite an impressive job as a character that might otherwise be considered out of his element. Perhaps he could have given some those acting pointers to David Bamber who portrayed a guy who looked less like Adolph Hitler than most Charlie Chaplin costumes I see on Halloween.

Despite an opening scene that would have Private Ryan's lawyer suing for plagiarism in addition to your fair share of typical cheesy, intense action-movie one-liners, the film's direction was quite good. For example, the bold recurrence of the swastika really gets the message across regarding the amount of power and pride the treasonists were truly up against. Sadly, though, this particular Tom Cruise wartime movie does not contain any homoerotic volleyball scenes.

While history books don't leave a whole lot of mystery to the ending of the film, Valkyrie is a solid pick for any World War II or drama enthusiast and, I suppose, both of you Tom Cruise fans out there.