July 20, 1944—German resistance against the Nazis—a movement in which tens of thousands were jailed, exiled or executed—came the closest to its desired goal when Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, a high-level staff officer, placed a briefcase containing a bomb under an oak table in Adolf Hitler’s headquarters in East Prussia.
The count left the room as if to make a call. Shortly thereafter, upon seeing a body carried out, he assumed his plan to assassinate the Fuehrer had succeeded.
The count left the room as if to make a call. Shortly thereafter, upon seeing a body carried out, he assumed his plan to assassinate the Fuehrer had succeeded.
But the colonel’s diminished eyesight—the result of war wounds that left him without his left eye, right hand, and two fingers of his left hand—meant he was tragically mistaken, and shortly thereafter he and his circle of co-conspirators were apprehended and executed.
(Official Nazi records indicate that approximately 7,000 were arrested in the immediate wake of the failed coup; nearly 5,800 were executed in the closing months of 1944, with another 5,700 put to death for their involvement the following year.)
Faithful reader, have you seen Valkyrie? Is it worthwhile for me to get it on DVD? The supporting cast interested me, but I found ridiculous even the idea of casting Tom Cruise as the tragic Stauffenberg. When it comes to eyepatch heroes, I’ll take John Wayne’s Rooster Cogburn anytime.
I’m not sure how historically accurate this true-life thriller was, but the way I figure it, if you want a good sense of the events and people involved in the conspiracy, the best thing you can do is decidedly old-fashioned: turn to a good book:
* The main action in Peter Quinn’s topnotch detective thriller The Hour of the Cat occurs six years before the Valkyrie conspiracy, but it features one of the most shadowy figures in the July 1944 plot: Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the Nazi spymaster who engaged in a dangerous double game to bring down the Fuehrer.
* Michael Beschloss’ history The Conquerors is principally about the two American Presidents who demolished the Third Reich and created a durable postwar European order—Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman. But the deft opening chapter economically but richly summarizes Stauffenberg’s plot and the Allied reaction to it (FDR had no comment—he did not want the Soviets to think he was going back on his “unconditional surrender” pledge, but figured that anything which weakened the Nazis couldn’t be all bad).
* Berlin Diaries, 1940-1945, by Marie Vassiltchikov is written from the point of view of a White Russian émigré princess, many of whose close friends participated in the conspiracy. You won’t find the logistics of the plotters, but will discover the kind of expertly observed atmospherics you’d expect to find in an espionage thriller: the hurried, whispered confidences of plotters; the initial euphoria when it appeared the plot had succeeded; and the dashed hopes upon learning “the Devil” (as Vassiltchikov called Hitler) had in fact survived. An amazing true story, which--big surprise!--Hollywood has completely ignored since its 1987 publication.
Cruise’s faith in Scientology became fodder for controversy during filming, with the Stauffenberg family in particular annoyed by his casting. But the actor’s religious beliefs bother me less than how Hollywood treats the spiritual convictions of the real-life conspirators.
Early in the war, for instance, Canaris had secretly employed the services of the anti-Nazi Lutheran minister Dietrich Bonhoeffer. By the time of the unraveling of the Valkyrie plot, the two men had already ended up in prison, but the Nazi hunt for a paper trail around the conspirators uncovered their role, too. Bonhoeffer, like Canaris, was executed in 1945, but his writings would go on to inspire Martin Luther King Jr. and Desmond Tutu.
The film Valkyrie does not include Bonhoeffer at all among its cast of characters. Just as odd is the omission of the spiritual motives behind the participation of Stauffenberg himself.
The colonel and his family were staunch Roman Catholics; in fact, Marie Vassiltchikov’s diary noted that a fellow conspirator was certain that the colonel was “such a fervent Christian that Masses are surely being said for him all over Germany” after his arrest.
In ransacking Stauffenberg’s papers for evidence, the Gestapo discovered Mit Brennender Sorge (“With Burning Anxiety”), Pope Pius XI’s 1937 encyclical condemning Nazism, as well as sermons by Bishop Clemens August von Galen, an opponent of Nazism who had loudly denounced the Nazis’ euthanasia program from the pulpit.
Faithful reader, have you seen Valkyrie? Is it worthwhile for me to get it on DVD? The supporting cast interested me, but I found ridiculous even the idea of casting Tom Cruise as the tragic Stauffenberg. When it comes to eyepatch heroes, I’ll take John Wayne’s Rooster Cogburn anytime.
I’m not sure how historically accurate this true-life thriller was, but the way I figure it, if you want a good sense of the events and people involved in the conspiracy, the best thing you can do is decidedly old-fashioned: turn to a good book:
* The main action in Peter Quinn’s topnotch detective thriller The Hour of the Cat occurs six years before the Valkyrie conspiracy, but it features one of the most shadowy figures in the July 1944 plot: Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the Nazi spymaster who engaged in a dangerous double game to bring down the Fuehrer.
* Michael Beschloss’ history The Conquerors is principally about the two American Presidents who demolished the Third Reich and created a durable postwar European order—Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman. But the deft opening chapter economically but richly summarizes Stauffenberg’s plot and the Allied reaction to it (FDR had no comment—he did not want the Soviets to think he was going back on his “unconditional surrender” pledge, but figured that anything which weakened the Nazis couldn’t be all bad).
* Berlin Diaries, 1940-1945, by Marie Vassiltchikov is written from the point of view of a White Russian émigré princess, many of whose close friends participated in the conspiracy. You won’t find the logistics of the plotters, but will discover the kind of expertly observed atmospherics you’d expect to find in an espionage thriller: the hurried, whispered confidences of plotters; the initial euphoria when it appeared the plot had succeeded; and the dashed hopes upon learning “the Devil” (as Vassiltchikov called Hitler) had in fact survived. An amazing true story, which--big surprise!--Hollywood has completely ignored since its 1987 publication.
Cruise’s faith in Scientology became fodder for controversy during filming, with the Stauffenberg family in particular annoyed by his casting. But the actor’s religious beliefs bother me less than how Hollywood treats the spiritual convictions of the real-life conspirators.
Early in the war, for instance, Canaris had secretly employed the services of the anti-Nazi Lutheran minister Dietrich Bonhoeffer. By the time of the unraveling of the Valkyrie plot, the two men had already ended up in prison, but the Nazi hunt for a paper trail around the conspirators uncovered their role, too. Bonhoeffer, like Canaris, was executed in 1945, but his writings would go on to inspire Martin Luther King Jr. and Desmond Tutu.
The film Valkyrie does not include Bonhoeffer at all among its cast of characters. Just as odd is the omission of the spiritual motives behind the participation of Stauffenberg himself.
The colonel and his family were staunch Roman Catholics; in fact, Marie Vassiltchikov’s diary noted that a fellow conspirator was certain that the colonel was “such a fervent Christian that Masses are surely being said for him all over Germany” after his arrest.
In ransacking Stauffenberg’s papers for evidence, the Gestapo discovered Mit Brennender Sorge (“With Burning Anxiety”), Pope Pius XI’s 1937 encyclical condemning Nazism, as well as sermons by Bishop Clemens August von Galen, an opponent of Nazism who had loudly denounced the Nazis’ euthanasia program from the pulpit.
Galen’s traditionalism in politics and religion was an outlook shared by Stauffenberg, and Adolf Hitler indicated that, once victory was secured, the bishop would share the same fate—execution—as the courageous staff officer.
You could argue, I suppose, that a script doesn't have time for such background. But that's just an excuse. Character makes action plausible. I can't help but wonder if Hollywood's secular outlook colored how it looked at the background surrounding this great failed opportunity to bring down a tyrant.
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