The immediate appeal of Valkyrie is its apparent camp value, demonstrated byits awful, inappropriate trailer- Tom Cruise as a Nazi with an eye patch. The fact that the movie is by Brian Singer, a commercially successful filmmaker whose pictures I have always found lacking in heart meant that I did not exactly bound into the theatre (My friend and I were supposed to see another film but we arrived late). I expected a boring, empty movie and pleasantly surprised to find that Valkyrie is an effective piece of cinema.
Fans of Cruise (which will probably make up most of the audience) will probably be disappointed that he abandons his usual charmingly arrogant persona and gives perhaps the most understated performance of his career. He’s good in the role and wears the eyepatch without looking ridiculous, but I wouldn’t be surprised if many complain that they didn’t get what they expect from a Cruise picture. It’s proof that sometimes being a movie star gets in the way of an audience’s inability to see an actor. Set Cruise’s persona and bizarre personal behavior aside, and you’ll believe that you are looking at Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg.
Stauffenberg was an instrumental figure in the German resistance to the Third Reich and came painfully close to assassinating Hitler in 1944, the subject for the film. The idea was brave, heroic, and somewhat ingenious – after Stauffenberg plants a bomb that should kill the Fuhrer, accomplices will institute Operation Valkyrie- a backstop employed by Hitler to prevent a coup by the SS, meaning that the military will overturn his government while thinking they are supporting it.
Although the film has a few scenes with Stauffenberg’s wife (Carice van Houten), Valkyrie is essentially a heist film, albeit a very, very serious one. I liked, however, that the plan was so complex and intricately detailed, which gives the film an air of plausibility that a lot WWII films lack. To a degree, however, this is also a flaw of the picture, as I wanted to know why these particular officers realized that the Third Reich’s evil policies must be stopped, when so many Germans at the time did not.
Whatever the reasoning, they must be given credit for it. The movie ends with a quote from the German resistance memorial, stating that these men did not bear the shame that so many in the rest of the country did. There story deserves to be told, and while not a great film, Valkyrie does a good job in telling part of it.