Cruise’s Valkyrie Role Gets Trashed

Poor Tom Cruise. The man wants to be known as an actor! Not some crazy, couch jumping, psychiatrist hating cult nut. And with last week’s announcement that he’d been nominated for a Golden Globe award for his awesome cameo in Tropic Thunder, it looked like he might have finally started to turn the page on the past few years of horrible/weird publicity and do just that, re-become an actor.

Well, don’t count on it. If you believe the Germans, his turn as Claus Count Schenk von Stauffenberg (AKA the guy who unsuccessfully tried to assassinate Hitler) in the upcoming Valkyrie is completely and utterly horrible. The worst performance in the history of worst performances. According to Berlin paper Der Tagesspiegel, “his image as an actor has been finally ruined by Valkyrie.” Bummer.

In fairness to Cruise, the Germans may be slightly biased. Not because they hate him any more than most nations, but because von Stauffenberg is probably their greatest modern day war hero, and Tom Cruise is a height challenged American action hero who believes in aliens. Imagine having to watch Roberto Benigni star in Saving Private Ryan instead of Tom Hanks and you kind of get the picture.