Image copyright © by Marcus Trahan

Valkyrie

(2008)

This movie faces the same problem that was handled so brilliantly in The Day of the Jackal (the original, not the putrid Bruce Willis re-make): How do you build tension in an assassination attempt that you know, going into the theater, is going to fail? Jackal did it by the meticulous, step-by-step planning, creating, and execution of the Jackal’s ingenious plan. By the time the deadly shot is fired, you’re on the edge of your seat, even though you know he’s going to miss, somehow. In Valkyrie, we know Hitler will survive the plot by Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg (and, it begins to seem, half of the German High Command), will fail, and if you know as much real history (as opposed to Frederick Forsyth fictional history) as I do, you even know how it will fail. So the writer here was banking on us not knowing much about the aftermath of the failed plot, and thus the attempt itself happens with at least a half hour still to go. Myself, I didn’t know all the details of the political aspect of the plot, I just knew that Stauffenberg tried to kill the motherfucker and failed, and was himself executed. And all this is interesting, but not as compelling as it should be. It’s not a bad film, and it looks great, but it didn’t really get me going. The cast is great, though, from Tom Cruise to Bill Nighy and Kenneth Branagh and Tom Wilkinson and Terrence Stamp … and I was right! That was Eddie Izzard in that German general’s uniform at the Wolf’s Lair!