They should have asked advice to the director of Das Boot

Rating: 5/10 (10 September 2004)

Imagine, it's 1941 and a German U-boat is roaming the North Atlantic in search of Allied ships to sink and to make an end to the supply line from the USA to Britain. This would have been a great theme for a movie on itself (remember Das Boot). But apparently the director was afraid it wouldn't be enough, he had to make it a little more spectacular. He wants us to believe that the Americans sent out one of their own submarines to recover an enigma-machine from a German U-boat who broke down in the middle of the ocean and who had to wait for another U-boat to arrive with spare parts... Why they added this? I really don't know, but in my opinion it doesn't do any good to the movie.
If you've seen Das Boot and if you are a great fan, like me, you'll probably notice that several of U-571's scenes resemble to the scenes from Das Boot. I'm not saying they copied it, but from time to time I really had a feeling of: Been there, seen that... The same for the acting. It wasn't bad, but wasn't brilliant either. You can see that they watched Das Boot several times before starting to act themselves. This means that you sometimes will have the feeling that you already know the characters, that you've met them before... I would say the actors did a good job, without excelling. They helped me to forget about the bad story ... from time to time.
All in all U-571 isn't a good movie. You'll find it well worth seeing when you haven't seen Das Boot before and when you don't know anything about World War II. They should have asked advice to the director of Das Boot. He certainly knew how to give you the feeling that you were into that boat, being attacked by the enemy, alone with the crew and no-one to come to the rescue. I really missed that in U-571. To me, this movie isn't worth much more than a 5/10.