Claus von Stauffenberg, a man famous for being a German Army Officer who came closest to a assassinating Adolf Hitler. Von Stauffenberg is the closest figure Germany has to a national hero during World War 2. It's surprising that it took so long for a film to be made, nor to be a German film.

Valkyrie is a test project for the newly reformed United Artists under Tom Cruise and Paula Wagner. It was also a smaller project for Bryan Singer after doing 3 superhero films and reunite Singer and Christoper McQuarrie for the first time after the Usual Suspects.

Valkyrie starts with a prelogue sequence in North Africa. Von Stauffenberg (Tom Cruise) is a disaffected officer who is questioning Hitler's regime and that he was leading Germany to the path of destruction. During a British air raid he is injured badly, loosing an eye, his right hand and two fingers on his left hand. He can no longer serve on the front line. In 1943 General Henning von Tresckow (Kenneth Branagh) fails in his attempt to assassin Hitler and the German Resistance loss an army officer to help with operations. Von Stauffenberg is recruited in the resistance and the General Staff. He comes up with the Valkyrie plan which was to make the assassination of Hitler look like an SS plot, and get the army to launch a coup to 'protect' the Nazi regime. Von Stauffenberg is the only man who could get close to Hitler because he was the Chief-of-Staff for the Reserve Army General. The film is split into three major parts, the planning, the assassination attempt and the attempted coup.

Singer was able to bring in a very stylist approach of direction. I enjoy Singer's films and he was able to show his skills again. He is able to get an excellent cast, including Bill Nighy, Kenneth Branagh, Terrence Stamp and Tom Wilkingson to name a few. However, he shot the film in the style of a thriller, which was interesting, but being a historical film with most people knowing the outcome already takes away the suspense. But Singer did make an enjoyable film. The film has a strong script

Valkyrie is a strong, enjoyable film. It is not Singer's best but he can still pull it of.

Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg (Tom Cruise) is disillusioned with Hitler and the war. He abhors the atrocities committed by the SS. He is severely injured in North Africa. Major-General Henning von Tresckow (Kenneth Branagh) is the military leader of a coup but his attempt to kill Hitler fails. General Friedrich Olbricht (Bill Nighy) recruits von Stauffenberg who comes up with a plan to use Operation Valkyrie which is set up to maintain order after the death of Hitler. They need the head of the reserve army General Friedrich Fromm (Tom Wilkinson) to order Valkyrie while they try to rewrite the operational manual so that the SS won't interfere with the coup.

Director Bryan Singer brings a solid workmanship to the production. Tom Cruise's reserved acting lacks a certain excitement. The story is told competently. It could easily be lost in the labyrinth of characters but the awesome cast is able to give each character his due. I'm also glad Singer didn't try to have the cast do fake German accents. The movie does lack the thrills but it still has a low-burning intensity.

Tom Cruise is one of those actors who can't shake a youthful image. When one thinks of him, one thinks of All The Right Moves, Top Gun, even Taps as the young brat packer. Of all the young players of the Eighties labeled the Brat Pack, Cruise has had the most staying power by far.

In Valkyrie, Cruise holds his own with some classically trained players from across the pond like Terrence Stamp, Kenneth Branagh, and Tom Wilkinson. These folks in varying degrees participate in the plot named Operation Valkyrie to assassinate Adolph Hitler and hopefully bring about a short conclusion of the war.

Working against them was the unconditional surrender policy agreed to by the Allies. Everyone well remembered Hitler's skillful use of the betrayal issue that came about in that interregnum between the Armistice and the Versailles Treaty. The Allies wanted Germany beaten with no doubt about it this time around.

And they would have had to have bagged a whole gang of them, Himmler, Goering, Goebbels, Bormann etc. for it to work. Nobody on the Allied side would have dealt with any of these specimens. In fact when they did break the policy and negotiate a surrender with Marshal Pietro Badoglio and due to circumstances to lengthy to go into here, the objective was not accomplished and we had a yard by yard war up the Italian peninsula instead of a quick surrender.

Cruise let's face it is not a brat packer any more. In fact he's roughly the age that Stauffenberg was when he became the point man for bombing on July 20, 1944. He even looks a bit like him. There's also a trace of the German aristocratic air about him that Stauffenberg was. Claus von Stauffenberg did come from an old Catholic aristocratic family with a military tradition who saw the Nazis as parvenus. But it was hard to argue with Hitler's early military success, especially for a military man.

The performance really to watch here is that of Tom Wilkinson who is a really oily individual as General Fromm who was trying so hard to keep himself in good with both sides so he could come out on top. As for what happened to him, watch a very worthwhile film to find out.