Review: Valkyrie (2/5)

Valkyrie
(Bryan Singer):
Tom Cruise,
Running time: 120 minutes. (12A)

Here’s the story of a plot to save the world from Tom Cruise. He plays Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, a stiff Nazi who masterminds the true life plot to kill Hitler and overthrow the Reich at the height of World War Two. Only the movie won’t allow Cruise to be himself. It blows off a hand, another three fingers, and deprives him of an eye. But worst of all, it won’t allow him to beam that pearly smile. They might as well have blown off his head.
Cruise, with a supporting cast including Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy and Terence Stamp, is engaged in high treason. Yet, just one minute of The Lives of Others contains more angsty paranoia than this entire film. Valkyrie belongs to what I call the pissing-in-the-wind genre: try as it can, it’s battling against the prevailing wind of history. The plot failed. Hitler lived. Director Bryan (The Usual Suspects) Singer tries to work up some tension, but you can’t get it out of your head. With the outcome in mind, you look for something else: a test of character, perhaps. But Cruise is unflappable – an unemotional, teutonic machismo. Churchill was sweating nightly into his brandy. But Tom’s von Stauffenberg hasn’t a jackboot of self doubt.