decent submarine thriller that adds little to a crowded genre-- but a good 2 hrs of entertainment

Rating: Null/10 (5 June 2000)

let's set aside the tired comparisons with Das Boot and accept that U 571 is a competent if unspectacular Hollywood version of history. If the UK were a country of 260 million film goers, maybe Hollywood would have gotten the Enigma part of the story right. Sorry but commercial realities are what they are. Hey, at least we speak sort of the same language so in a sense the flow of history is implicit in everything Hollywood does. Anglophony won.
The movie gives what I took as a realistic sense of what it would have been like in a WW2 sub under fire, etc etc. I liked it but then again I liked Saving PR. So shoot me. 7 out of 10 for me. I did not look at my watch once.
If anyone is scrolliing through this site looking for a cool idea for a movie, how about "Is Paris Burning?" Reads like a screenplay to me and it's serious history.