Valkyrie, starring Tom Cruise and various others. This movie is a decent retelling of the bomb plot against Hitler. Cruise is convincing as the hero--he’s a little stiff, but then, Von Stauffenberg was a member of the Prussian military caste. If you want easygoing, ask a Bavarian. The motivation behind Von Stauffenberg’s eagerness to cleanse Germany’s soul is told rather than shown (a mess up like the one shown in Africa could happen in any army, I fear). However, there is a lot of material to get through here, so the prologue is all we really need.
The planning is shown in meticulous detail, as is some of the political byplay, and it wasn’t boring, at least to me. It was clear that the guy in charge of communications at the Wolf’s Lair was not thrilled to be involved. Why he was not replaced by a noncom outside the wire blowing up the trunk line will probably remain forever unknown, but that was a truly fatal mistake.
Obviously, they lost. One of the key factors in that loss was Hitler talking on the phone to the leader of the ground troops in Berlin, and not targeting the radio stations and communications first, even before the SS. As it turned out, the end of the conspiracy was signaled by their phone lines being cut. The phrase “this is a military operation—of course it won’t go according to plan” was all too true, but the plan itself was sadly flawed. How ironic that Himmler, the most feared member of the Nazis, had no role in thwarting the plot, while Goebbels, an afterthought, actually managed to end the attempted coup far more effectively than SS gunfire.
One major flaw in the movie itself, though, will show up fast to anyone who knows the story. Where is Rommel? No mention was made of his part in the plot at all. Okay, Tom Cruise is the star, etc. etc., but c’mon, where’s the Desert Fox when you need him? His suicide didn’t even show up in the ‘what happened to…” list at the end.
Anyway, it was still a pretty decent movie, even if a bright five year old could have pointed out some of the plan’s flaws. Worth seeing.

Iron Man—Tony Stark isn’t quite like Bruce Wayne. He didn’t witness his parentss’ death (though his mother is never mentioned), but the main plot is much the same. Placed in deadly peril, Tony builds a way to escape and to avenge the death of a friend who helped him. In a society obsessed with toys, Mr. Stark has the coolest of them all, including a CAD/CAM setup to die for, a data search capacity similar to that in Minority Report (a system similar to that is currently under development), and a nifty robot named Jeeves.
After his escape, Tony returns to redirect the focus of his company. Unfortunately, changing corporate culture is not as easy as it looks. The terms of a hostile takeover end up becoming fatal to a number of people. Jeff Bridges is great in the role of Obadiah Stane who appears to be a loyal partner, although there are hints that he is not entirely comfortable in Tony’s shadow. Gwyneth Paltrow is deliberately less glamorous than usual as the able personal assistant ‘Pepper’ Potts, but plays a key role in affairs (Tony should marry her now!). Terrence Howard is true blue as the liaison who coordinates Stark’s work with the military. Whoever is the voice of Jeeves is perfect, while the second star of the show, the Suit, performs brilliantly. Stan Lee is cute in his cameo as Hugh Hefner.
This movie is action oriented without being stupid, touches on many real issues in the world today, and shows off some seriously cool toys (of which the Jericho missile system is one). I strongly recommend this movie, and hope they make a sequel. Note—stay for the credits! There’s an extra goodie that this former Merry Marvelite had a lot of fun with.
And yes, I know this review is absurdly late, and it's on DVD now. Well, watch it anyway, especially if you have a bigger screen TV (which we do, now, a 32-incher which is marked improvement over the 19" one we watched for several months after the old one died).