Valkyrie (movie)

not all Hero's are perfect.

 

Stefan,

At what exact date is somone no longer a hero if they plan to kill Hitler?

is it 1939? 1943? What date would you brand someone "too late to be a hero" for trying to kill Hitler?

 

I disagree in that ALL of them supported Herr mustache from the very beginning. Admiral Canaris didn't and who also had several run-ins w/ Reinhard Heydrich & others throughout the war.

 

Couldn't agree more. IMHO, this seems to be the act of someone abandoning a sinking ship. A brave man yes, but that's the extent of it.

 

Depends who they are, what they were doing in the mean time and why they did it. Literally a hero is a demigod, an incredible being who is somehow above and beyond the rest of mankind. In more modern times it has come to mean someone who from a position of weakness overcame great power, who displayed 'moral excellence' in great adversity. I do not feel that Stauffenberg fills this definition, he was a man who despite missgivings went along with Hitler for years, he fought for the Nazis as long as they were winning. When things started to look bad and he realised they were likely to loose he changed his mind, this to me is not heroic.

So sure, you can't pin it on a date, but to support the Nazi war effort for that long and change sides when it looks like they might lose, sorry, brave though that is it doesn't make you heroic. He stood by and watched whilst too much evil was done to be a hero.

N. B. Please don't think I am getting on any kind of moral high horse, hell, as a German soldier in that era most likely I would have done what I was told and got on with it. I am not claiming to be in any way morally superior to the plotters.

 

Talked to an older man this morning who saw the film last night. He too, does not like Tom (couch jumping short stuff) Cruise, but he said that the film was fantastic. I asked him how, he said, "as pure entertainment, it was great!"
So maybe I need to give it a chance. I'll go see it and let you know what I think.

 

Hi Scott, I haven't seen it yet but, what that gent told you, is how we should view all of these hollywoodland type movies-with a grain of salt and as pure entertainment. The same should have been said (which iv'e said here for many years) about U 571 & Harts War. ;-)) I can't stand tom Cruise either-and fully agree you and will give it a watching anyway.

 

Also remember that being considered a 'hero' is very subjective.

I liked this movie, although as noted in previous posts, the content is questionable in some areas.

Yours,

Bill

 

I've seen it twice, it is a very good film. The only criticism I have is that it seemed too "documentary-esque" at times but other than that I thought the acting/directing and script was fantastic.

 

Found this pic of von Stauffenberg on another site. I thought these comments funny ." For some reason, it's hard to imagine Tom Cruise in this pose."." Pat,
just put him on a Shetland pony." LOL

 

I saw the trailer at the cinema and I noticed big bad Tom was doing his Mr Hand speech from M.I. films. Please I hope he's not going to be like that all the time in this film.

 

Krieg is off to see this film later this coming week cannot wait Krieg

 

I saw it yesterday, well, I'm one of those who would normally avoid anything with Cruise in it by as many miles as possible, he's actually not too bad in this and the movie in general isn't the turkey I expected. However, it could have been done a lot better, there could have been a lot more tension at certain parts, the director falls down there IMO and it's overly simplistic in screenwriting story. Some of the casting is just plain odd, if you think Cruise is miscast, Bernard Hill just looks completely out of place to me, granted in a brief appearance, and Eddy Izzard?? WTF? I almost laughed out loud when I saw him, yes that's transvestite comic Eddy Izzard for those not familiar.
Anyway, it's a decent watch but I couldn't recommend it, overall not very memorable.

 

Some thumbs up and some wavering, hmmm interesting. Keep them coming as we in the UK still got a couple of weeks to wait.

 

It came to me after why I didn't find it particularly memorable but I forgot to mention it, it's also lacking depth IMO. It works as a straight plot movie but there's no soul searching as there would be in such an event, we dont know what von Stauffenberg is really thinking aside from a couple of lines early on. In fact we learn absolutely nothing about von Stauffenberg the man, he's pretty one dimensional and it's not Cruise's fault acting wise, we just get the plot which we already know and the outcome... tell me something I dont know to get my attention, so it's a bit of a wasted opportunity I think.
And if it's not known what made von Stauffenberg tick it's where good screenplay comes in to weave more depth into the thing. You could argue it's aimed at the mainstream audience who dont know anything about von Stauffenberg or the plot anyway, for me it could have been a lot better.

 

Biscuits;
What made Von Stauffenberg tick? Did you catch the real hate during the Fuhrer scenes? This is one GREAT flick. Why is this such a huge and moving historical experience? Well, because people like US stay on the filmmakers' cases. Operating on the basic assumption that the TRUTH is much better than anything any writer could ever make up... Keep up the good work, my friends!
JeffinMNUSA
PS. Kenneth Brannagh as Von Trescow was absolutely brilliant; http://www.aceshowbiz.com/still/00004036/valkyrie14.html

 

I went to see it last week. It wasn't bad at all. Tom Cruise did a good job, and I know that a lot of people wanted to see him fall on his face with this one. The movie showed how difficult it was to "remove" Hitler without it being a one-way suicide mission and to insure that the Nazi's were to be arrested and neutralized during the installment of the new government. It did fall short at the end concerning the round-up of the conspirators though, specifically how Hitler had them filmed during their executions for his viewing pleasure while he dined.

 

The end was bizarre...the executions seemed way too disorganized.

 

Thats it, youve ruined it, I'm not going now...Wofly's just told us the end of the movie...What happened to being quiet when you exited the theatre...Great I'll put me popcorn back.