The movie Valkyrie, starring Tom Cruise, released in theaters on December 25, 2008 and will be released on DVD on May 19, 2009. The film stars Tom Cruise, Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, Eddie Izzard, Terence Stamp and Tom Wilkinson.
Valkyrie is based upon the true story of Colonel Claus Von Stauffenberg, a Nazi officer who was a leader in the conspiracy to assassinate Adolf Hitler during World War II in July of 1944. The war movie
Colonel Von Stauffenberg was a German army officers who plotted with other German officers to use Operation Valkyrie to take control of Germany as part of their assassination plan to deploy the Reserve Army in the event of a national emergency like Hitler’s assassination.
Valkyrie is an important movie as it clearly depicts the depth of animosity and fear many of Hitler’s officer felt towards the Führer as well as their willingness to act – even if it meant death – to rid Germany of the man they were sure would be Germany’s downfall. The officers of Valkyrie believed that by ridding Germany of the dictator who ruled the country, they might save Germany from Hitler as well as the advancing Allies.
However, Valkyrie is not without its flaws. There are quite a few key players in Valkyrie, most of them Nazi officers. There is a great deal of plotting, and planning, and discussing. The movie is promoted as an “action-packed thriller,” but there isn’t a great deal of thrill or action to Valkyrie except in certain war scenes, most notably at the beginning of the movie where Von Stauffenberg suffers serious, disfiguring injuries.
The movie is two hours long, and some of those 120 minutes are tedious planning sessions. Even the assassination attempt is not action-packed. However, much of history wasn’t thrilling – it was planning, plotting, and plodding along, waiting for things to come together.
While Valkyrie does not succeed as an action movie, one of the biggest downers in Valkyrie is history itself. Knowing how Hitler died, even if viewers are not familiar with Colonel Claus Von Stauffenberg, they know there will be no happy ending. But Valkyrie does succeed in bringing home the heroic sacrifice of the German officers who were willing to give up everything to fight evil and save their country.
Valkyrie is rated PG-13 for some violence.
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