Tom Cruise's German Turn

German critics are saying “nein” to Tom Cruise’s turn as war hero Claus von Stauffenberg in Valkyrie. “The only thing that can definitely be said about this cinema adventure is that Tom Cruise, who has been damaged by his bizarre talk show behavior, may well continue storming the heights of the Scientology hierarchy as a Thetan, but his image as an actor has been finally ruined by Valkyrie,” wrote the film critic of Berlin paper Der Tagesspiegel. Upon hearing of the Cruise casting news, von Stauffenberg’s oldest son, Berthold Schenk Count, told Cruise to go back to America. Other reviews of Valkyrie, while not scathing, are unlikely to bolster the film’s Oscar hopes.