Thrilling Documentary !

Rating: Null/10 (30 June 2014)

Bryan Singer's Valkyrie (2008) reminded me of Anatole Litvak's The Night of the Generals (1967), and not for being - both - thrillers, taking place in Nazi Germany during WWII, and concerning German officers.
Valkyrie depicts the 20 July 1944 plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler. The plot failed, however Hitler ended up, not so long after, suicide (don't listen to Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds 2009!). So it's a movie where the good guys lose, which could allow a lukewarm feeling, especially while watching a Tom Cruise, Bryan Singer, Hollywood thriller. Unfortunately, that feeling fulfilled, yet due to extra other reasons.
The script focused only on the star; Tom Cruise as Colonel Von Stauffenberg. Because save him, you don't know a thing about the rest of the plotters; Just slight touches to separate one from another, more than characteristic features. You're even less informed in places, to ask about the identity, and the necessity, of that man who swims in a pool, mocking at "It's a drill, or not?", or that old, always infuriated, general who curses with insults like "Montgomery's whore", with no good answers. So when United Artists propagandized Valkyrie as "A character-driven thriller", you have to sense big deficiency.
Sometimes not speaking in a movie, with meaty image, produces something great. In this movie, it's enjoyable in counted moments. Like when the lead is shaving, however awfully tortured. Or when he plans the whole Valkyrie plot, while listening to Wagner's music, beaten under the bombing. But in more moments, frank oddity was the result. For instance, when the lead returns home, first-time handicapped, there is nearly no dialogue uttered, even from his children (who leave him to play??). Another moment when he arrives Hitler's meeting, secretly carrying a time bomb to assassinate Hitler, the latter eyes him in fearful manner, inexplicably; as if the movie wants to delude us that Hitler exposed everything, and our lead is in danger, yet in a forced way to naive extent. Generally, that technique concerned about visual tense at the expense of drama, which left good amount of emptiness, while having - in the same time - many different characters, motives, and events.
To add fuel to the flames, the dialogue was strictly informative more than expressive, witty, or fair to this blend of people. Many scenes, like the one of presenting the Valkyrie plan by the lead, felt extremely dry, exactly the way any uncreative documentary would make. Everybody speaks as directly as a robot. Any mildness is interdicted. And there wasn't enough heart. So when Terence Stamp's character commits suicide, easing up on himself: "I remember better times", it's like the script's attempt to capture a historical moment, however sternly, with no juice or much background. This is why you eventually don't feel satisfied by the movie's list of actors like Terence Stamp, Kenneth Branagh, Tom Wilkinson and others. Because other than falling in the big shadow of Cruise's character, they were wronged by semi-mute script!
In the operation part, things run clearly mute, with a feel of flat documentary. It isn't about the nature of Valkyrie's plot as a failure, or missing art re-writing history (a la Tarantino's movie); it's about preferring suspense on human beings, and in a movie with no familiar "suspenseful-movie-climax". So while the script strove to build exciting moment after another; it forgot to dilute the viewer's negative emotional load, out of executing all the plotters at last, with adequate character study. Therefore, the movie became a thrilling documentary about bunch of failures, more than character-driven thriller about courageous heroes.
David Bamber as the Führer of Germany was perfectly pale, being a short unperceivable guy. Depriving Hitler from charisma and menace, in a movie where he's the main target and enemy, is a fatal mistake. And the movie's tricks to compensate this miscast, and misdirect, were pathetic as I showed early. John Ottman's music was too undertone to effect, enhancing the movie's cold character.
Pros: There are plenty of well-made suspenseful moments. The CGI is impressively inspiring. Cruise counties smashing his image as Mr. Handsome, enjoying disfiguring his face, to assure that he doesn't need his good looks to gain capability and popularity, as he did before in Born on the Fourth of July (1989), Interview with the Vampire (1994), Vanilla Sky (2001), and Tropic Thunder (2008). But he was the usual serious him, with a few exceptional moments, where the script granted him with precious material, like when he looked at his assistance, after winning Hitler's signature on the revised Valkyrie, with the most concealed victorious smile in his eyes. Bill Nighy won the best character around, the man who with and against the plot, and he did it with powerful imprint.
Valkyrie is pure thriller mixed with tepid documentary. It delivers the goods, but with undeniable disappointment; weather in terms of impossible happy end, or could-have-been possible dramatic satisfaction. It leaves you with more thrill than talks. While The Night of the Generals leaves you with more talks than thrill. Being unbalanced, in this part, is the main point of resemblance I meant between the 2 movies.