Valkyrie

Tom Cruise is crazy. You know it. I know it. Society knows it. But, damn can the man make a movie. I can't think of very man Tom Cruise movies over the years that I haven't liked. And you know what, I challenge you to do the same. One of my favorite movies of the past 5 years is the Last Samurai. Tom Cruise at his finest. He dropped off the map for awhile with this whole Katie Holmes and Suri thing, but he made a re-appearance with Tropic Thunder as the comedy relief.

So lets go through his most recent work. Valkyrie. Some of you or may not know, I was a history minor in college and the period I enjoyed studying the most about was World War II. Always found it fascinating. I remember reading about plots to overthrow Hitler, but I never really studied any of the specifics. In reality, I think its a great idea for a movie. It's a period piece that can still hit home with a few people, and it automatically does not have a happy ending. We know what occurred in history and it was clear that the plan wasn't going to be a success. There aren't that many movies that get filmed nowadays with an unhappy ending.

The story was well put together. I'm assuming they glorified some of the story so that it transferred onto the big screen cleanly. The characters were strong, some of them you didn't really get to know quite as well, but you definitely attach yourself to a few. They were willing to sacrifice everything for what they believed to be the greater good. They were true patriots of Germany and not patriots of Hitler. Because of the magnitude of their actions, you could easily understand why some were hesitant, scared in the way they were.

There was only hard to believe part of the film when he is working on recruiting individuals to his 'side' and I think you'll recognize it when/if you see it. Other than that, I could easily see all these things occurring as portrayed in the film.

The movie gets a bad wrap, most likely because of the whole Tom Cruise factor, but it was quite well done. Quoting Robby, "You have to rate it high. Tom Cruise has an eye patch, and we live in the eye patch capital of the world!"

i give it 4 Manatees, possibly 4.5, but only because I love movies about history and Tom Cruise