Valkyrie

I was happy to see this one do reasonably well in crowded Christmas weekend.  Tom Cruise remains a solid actor (an with skilled thespians Kenneth Branagh, Bill Nighy, Tom Wilkinson, Terence Stamp, and Eddie Izzard in the cast, Cruise shows he can hold his own).  Moreover, Bryan Singer knows how to direct a thriller, and Valkyrie is probably his best film yet (The Usual Suspects, while entertaining, is one of the most overrated films of all time).

As others have said, what’s amazing about Valkyrie is how thrilling it is even though you know how it ends.  Fortunately for Singer & company, most in the audience (the American audience, anyway) don’t know much about his particular episode in history.  Singer, I think, was largely counting on the audience’s ignorance, especially with regard to how close the attempted coup was to being a successful coup.  You’ll know better, but as the conspirators piece-by-piece take over Nazi Germany, you think they just might get away with it.  If only.