BEFORE: Another day, another dollar, another plot to kill Hitler...
THE PLOT: Based on actual events, a plot to assassinate Hitler is unfurled during the height of WWII.
AFTER: This is an action film with, in my opinion, an appalling lack of action - an inaction movie? Instead the film consists mostly of meetings and phone calls, and people signing paperwork. Heady stuff...
The concept here is that a few ambitious German officers saw that World War II was about to end poorly for the Germans, so they figured they would hasten the end of the war by taking Hitler out of the picture. In actuality there were 15 attempts on Hitler's life, so I don't know what made this bunch think they'd succeed where 14 other plots had failed - I guess they believed that old German expression, you know, "The fifteenth time's the charm."
This film also faced an uphill battle by trying to make Nazis sympathetic - I think they tried to codify it by separating "Nazis" from "Germans", after all not all Germans were Nazis at the time, but come on, it was the dominant government party.
(Spoiler alert - Hitler wasn't assassinated...)
Oh, if only the excitement and flair of "Inglourious Basterds" could have somehow been combined with the historical accuracy and demeanor of "Valkyrie" - but that's impossible, right? A boy can dream, though...
Starring Tom Cruise (last seen in "Lions for Lambs"), Kenneth Branagh (last seen in "Wild Wild West"), Bill Nighy (last seen in "Underworld: Rise of the Lycans"), Tom Wilkinson (last seen in "Black Knight"), Terence Stamp (last seen in "The Company of Wolves"), and Eddie Izzard (last seen in "All the Queen's Men").
RATING: 5 out of 10 firing squads
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