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Actor Tom Cruise says he grew up wanting to kill Hitler and jumped at the chance to do just that in his role as Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg in Valkyrie, a film about the failed attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler. He said he was distraught when he found out his character would not succeed, but that he refuses to give up on his dream.
“I don’t know when I’ll get to do it now. I’ve spent over 40 years of my life consumed with this rage, this hate, this anger. I just know the man has got to go,” he insisted in a voice that became higher and raspier as he spoke.
Director Bryan Singer expressed concern about Cruise from the start, but tolerated the actor’s instability because of his clout as a top box-office draw. “It never occurred to me he thought Hitler was still alive. All of us, we tried to tell him, but he would have none of it. He said he read some book – the history of kangaroos or something. Maybe that’s why he jumps up and down in interviews, I don’t know. The whole thing was a little unsettling, frankly.”
In an interview for Valkyrie’s upcoming DVD extra, “Tom is Crazy,” Cruise’s co-star, Eddie Izzard, who played the role of General Erich Fellgiebel, spoke softly of his cinematic comrade. “Hitler was a mass-murdering fuckhead as many important historians have said. But Tom, he’s a dead mass-murdering fuckhead. C’mon mate, chill out, have some jam.”
Berlin-headquartered newspaper Die Welt is unimpressed by both the film and Cruise’s performance, but mostly by Cruise himself. “He’s a nut job from the word gehen. He idolizes Scientology’s founder, L. Ron Hubbard, as a father. It’s very Oedipal, really. Hubbard’s own son drew numerous comparisons between Hitler and the elder Hubbard. So there you go – a simple case of transference.”
Die Welt’s review of Valkyrie rendered only one kudo. “At least they didn't mix up the eye-patch.”
