Valkyrie

Excuse my language, but this is not some shit that I would normally see. My love affair with Tom Cruise (The Last Samurai) ended after he went crazy about three years ago, so he’s not a good box office draw, at least not for me. But I was in the company of a handsome gentleman, and this was what he wanted to see – so I went with the flow.

Valkyrie is the story of a failed attempt to overthrow Hitler, and is factually-based. So, on a positive note, I can say that I actually learned something from the movie, and that’s a good thing. What wasn’t good was the overall vibe of the movie. Despite boasting an inherently exciting premise, something about Valkyrie felt lackluster and uninspiring. Cruise portrays Colonel von Stauffenberg, a rouge soldier in cahoots with other Nazis to oust Hitler for the greater good of Deutschland, and so as not to be remembered on the wrong side of history as an enabler of the most monstrous figure of the 20th century. Cool, I’m with that. Even sounds exciting, right? It should have been, but it wasn’t. Writer Christopher McQuarrie and director Bryan Singer are responsible for one of the all-time great movies (The Usual Suspects), but I think they struck out with this one. Cruise’s Stauffenberg seems stoic and resolute, but not especially heroic in that movie-star sort of way you’d expect. I felt my eyelids get heavy on more than one occasion and had to fight to keep them open at one point. I have a pretty good attention span too, so this is a reflection of the movie rather than any narcoleptic tendencies on my part. Valkyrie is as boring as it looks, so I suggest you skip it unless you’re some weird history buff. My handsome companion was also underwhelmed. Booo Valkyrie!! LOL