Demise of the Valkyries

Valkyrie. D: Brian Singer. Tom Cruise, the typical host of British actors playing German officers. Tom Cruise as the flower of German aristocracy? Eddie Izzard as a jittery plotter? No one can deny that it's a curiosity. 

In 1944, a group of disaffected German officers attempted to assassinate Adolf Hitler (portrayed here as cranky middle-aged duffer badly in need of a nap). They failed, due to a combination of poor planning and execution, bad luck, and loss of nerve. Valkyrie follows the unraveling of the plot in a perfunctory manner devoid of suspense, raising the question of why bother? Tom Wilkinson, who wears a weirdly askew toupee throughout, looks embarrassed to be a part of the whole endeavor (the movie, not the plot); an unrecognizable Bill Nighy must have been glad to be unrecognizable. Luckily for Kenneth Branagh, the High Command whisks him off to the Russian front shortly after the film begins. But Terence Stamp is the luckiest of all: He gets to shoot himself.

There is a story here. The plotters comprised the remnants of the German aristocracy, a dying breed whose doom was foretold by the French Revolution and sealed by World War II. For the most part, their actions -- whether motivated by a sense of honor, patriotism, or self-interest --were the death throes of a band of ultraconservatives hoping to restore their idea of a glorious era, a time that had passed no matter what the outcome of the war. The movie could have explored this dynamic, but didn't. But then, what do you expect out of a mainstream Hollywood movie, the most imaginative idea of which is to cast British actors as German officers? Why can't I ever come up with great ideas like that?...

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