Valkyrie (2008)

"...an exciting thriller and a useful history lesson.  Joe Morgenstern, Wall Street Journal
"A taut suspense flick for grown-ups.  Kyle Smith, New York Post
"The mechanics of the actual plot are pretty amazing. Singer has assembled a top-notch international cast.  Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly
"...admirably free of any Spielbergian effort to squeeze sentimentality or inspirational lessons out of what is a complicated and morally complex story.  Philip Kennicott, The Washington Post
"...a highly intelligent and deeply engrossing historical drama and, frame for frame, [2008]'s most suspenseful nail-biter.  William Arnold, Seattle Post-Intelligencer

Editor's Note Based on a the true story of cadre of Nazi officers who grew to oppose Hitler's murderous pursuits and made several attempts to kill him in the late stages of WWII, VALKYRIE features a top-flight cast, with drama and suspense in equal measure. The film is a stylistic departure for director Bryan Singer (X-MEN, X2) and star Tom Cruise, with a screenplay by Christopher McQuarrie (THE USUAL SUSPECTS) and Nathan Alexander that is constructed like a heist film, with a team of like-minded men coming together for a common purpose and facing incredible odds. It is 1943, and though he has come to be disgusted by Hitler's campaign of evil, Count Claus von Stauffenberg (Tom Cruise) has risen to the level of lieutenant colonel in the German army. Convinced that Hitler must die, Von Stauffenberg requests a transfer to Tunisia, where he loses his left eye and right hand during an Allied air raid. Falling in with a group of similarly disillusioned officers including Major General Henning von Tresckow (Kenneth Branagh), General Friedrich Olbricht (Bill Nighy), General Friedrich Fromm (Tom Wilkinson), and Colonel General Ludwig Beck (Terence Stamp), Stauffenberg is at the center of several attempts on Der Fuhrer's life, culminating in a bombing that kills a handful of his officers and leaves Hitler only slightly injured. Though advance photos of Cruise in Nazi uniform brought VALKYRIE negative publicity, his restrained performance is at the heart of this well-crafted, thinking person's action movie. He is bolstered by an incredible British cast including Branagh, Stamp, and Wilkinson, and by the film's dazzling art direction. Though it's a story to which viewers should already know the ending, Singer still creates ample suspense. The result is a taut and effective historical thriller.

	Kenneth Branagh
	Kevin McNally
	Bill Nighy
	Carice Van Houten
	Tom Wilkinson
	Eddie Izzard
	Tom Cruise
	Terence Stamp
	Christopher McQuarrie - Producer
	Lilly Kilvert - Production Designer
	Gilbert Adler - Producer
	Patrick Lumb - Production Designer
	Nathan Alexander - Co-Producer
	John Ottman - Editor
	John Ottman - Composer
	Christopher McQuarrie - Screenwriter
	Nathan Alexander - Screenwriter
	Newton Thomas Sigel - Director of Photography
	Joanna Johnston - Costume Designer
	Bryan Singer - Director

Rolling Stone
"X-MEN director Bryan Singer and his USUAL SUSPECTS screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie will keep you in the game....It's the palm-sweating suspense that counts." 01/08/2008 p.120

Los Angeles Times
"VALKYRIE is made with impeccable professionalism....There is a considerable amount of tension in VALKYRIE..." 12/25/2008

Chicago Sun-Times
3 stars out of 4 -- "VALKYRIE is a meticulous thriller....The two best supporting performances are by Kenneth Branagh...and Tom Wilkinson, as a general who artfully plays both sides of the fence..." 12/22/2008

Entertainment Weekly
"VALKYRIE, as field-commanded by director Bryan Singer, succeeds on its own terms as a handsome hybrid of conspiracy thriller and history lesson..." -- Grade: B 01/01/2009

Empire
3 stars out of 5 -- "As the coup kicks off, the drama truly grips." 02/01/2009

Washington Post
"Cruise manages his part respectably, with a combination of ramrod posture, starched costumes and minimalist acting....VALKYRIE is a brutally efficient bit of storytelling..." 12/25/2008

ReelViews 8 of 10
Going into this film, I wondered whether the filmmakers would succeed at generating tension out of an event whose outcome is so well-known. Even those with only a rudimentary knowledge of history are aware that Hitler did not die as the result of an assassination attempt; students of World War II know the ins and outs of the July 20, 1944 plot that ended with more than 5000 arrests and 200 executions. Yet director Bryan Singer has capably crafted this war thriller in such a way that one occasionally forgets the foregone conclusion and becomes wrapped up in the excitement of the moment...Valkyrie, despite being a more straightforward thriller, is less gripping than Downfall, the most recent film in which Hitler had significant screen time. David Bamber's physical resemblance to the dictator is effective enough for the few scenes in which he appears, but it goes without saying that he doesn't come close to Bruno Ganz's startling portrayal in Downfall. Tom Cruise is solid as Stauffenberg. Maybe it's partially the result of the eye patch, but the actor is quickly buried in the character, which is a feat in Cruise's case, since he is one of the few working celebrities who almost always seems bigger than the parts he plays...Verisimilitude is always a key element of a World War II movie, and Valkyrie goes all out. Many scenes were filmed on location in Berlin and, in those instances when a place no longer existed, it was meticulously recreated. As a result, Singer succeeds in the all-important task of transporting audiences back in time. As movies about the Nazi regime go, this one is a strong and successful recreation of one aspect of the war that does not receive much screen time. There may not be many white-knuckle moments in this thriller, but it's to the filmmakers' credit that we are nevertheless engrossed from start to finish, even though we know how this will all end up. - James Berardinelli

Chicago Sun-Times 8 of 10
"Valkyrie" is a meticulous thriller based on a large- scale conspiracy within the German army to assassinate Hitler, leading to a failed bombing attempt on July 20, 1944. At the center of the plot was Col. Claus von Stauffenberg, played here by Tom Cruise as the moving force behind the attempted coup, which led to 700 arrests and 200 executions, including von Stauffenberg's...Tom Cruise is perfectly satisfactory, if not electrifying, in the leading role. I'm at a loss to explain the blizzard of negative advance buzz fired at him for the effrontery of playing a half-blind, one-armed Nazi hero. Two factors may be to blame: (a) Cruise has attracted so much publicity by some of his own behavior (using Oprah's couch as a trampoline) that anything he does sincerely seems fair game for mockery, and (b) movie publicity is now driven by gossip, scandal and the eagerness of fanboys and girls to attract attention by posing as critics of movies they've almost certainly not seen...If I say that Cruise is not electrifying, I must add that with this character, in this story, he cannot and should not be. This is a film about veterans of officer rank, with all the reserve and probity that officers gather on the way up. They do not scream or hurry and do not care to be seen that way. They have learned not to panic under fire, and they have never been more under fire than now...The July 20 plot is an intriguing footnote to history, one of those "what if" scenarios. If it had succeeded, one of the hopes of the conspirators was said to be an alliance with the Allies against Russia. Given the political realities of the time, when Russia was seen as our ally, that would have been insane, but it shows the plotters continuing to dream of a reborn professional German army with roles for them. The question of the liberation of the death camps is a good one. Even the Allies did not bomb the rail lines leading to them. There were so very, very many people who did not know. - Roger Ebert