Valkyrie (Bryan Singer, 2008)

It's imperative for a historical biopic to bring something more to the table than just a straightforward retelling of events, when the eventual outcome is already well known. This becomes doubly vital if there's a loss of veracity with a change of language, and if there's any inkling that what we're getting is a vanity project, a star vehicle more than a dramatisation actually interested in the facts or participants.
It wasn't hard to suspect Tom Cruise as Claus von Stauffenberg, Hitler's would-be assassin, would fall prey to these failings. The usual boxes of the Hollywood WWII epic are ticked, of course: a rotation of British heavyweights as the top-ranking staff, a lot of terse secret rendezvouses and the obligatory sense of portentous urgency with a smattering of Wagner thrown in. But Cruise never really steps out of his dogged Mission: Impossible mode, with scowling and flashbacks filling in for character depth.

4/10