This smacks of a convenient excuse to me. If it hadn't be this, it would have been "you can't cast a person of non-German descent in the role."
The fact that Tom Cruise is a crazy cultist and gullible in the exteme has nothing to do with the parts he plays. Unless this film is being produced by the Church of Scienttology, the Germans are behaving like... well, Nazis. (Plus, it seems the Germans are jumping the gun here. The fimmakers haven't even requested to walk where their precious Nazis and rebellious Nazis once walked.)
The fact that Tom Cruise is a crazy cultist and gullible in the exteme has nothing to do with the parts he plays. Unless this film is being produced by the Church of Scienttology, the Germans are behaving like... well, Nazis. (Plus, it seems the Germans are jumping the gun here. The fimmakers haven't even requested to walk where their precious Nazis and rebellious Nazis once walked.)
Germans bar film company from shooting in German historical sites if Tom Cruise takes part
By Louis Charbonneau
BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany has barred the makers of a movie about a plot to kill Adolf Hitler from filming at German military sites because its star Tom Cruise is a Scientologist, the Defence Ministry said on Monday.
Cruise, also one of the film's producers, is a member of the Church of Scientology which the German government does not recognize as a church. Berlin says it masquerades as a religion to make money, a charge Scientology leaders reject.
The U.S. actor has been cast as Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, leader of the unsuccessful attempt to assassinate the Nazi dictator in July 1944 with a bomb hidden in a briefcase.
Defence Ministry spokesman Harald Kammerbauer said the film makers "will not be allowed to film at German military sites if Count Stauffenberg is played by Tom Cruise, who has publicly professed to being a member of the Scientology cult".
"In general, the Bundeswehr (German military) has a special interest in the serious and authentic portrayal of the events of July 20, 1944 and Stauffenberg's person," Kammerbauer said.
Cruise's publicists could not be reached for comment.
Stauffenberg had been deeply opposed to the Nazis' treatment of the Jews and planted a briefcase bomb under a table near Hitler in his "Wolf's Lair" headquarters on July 20, 1944. The bomb went off but only wounded the Fuehrer.
The film, slated for a 2008 release and to be directed by Bryan Singer and co-starring Kenneth Branagh, is called "Valkyrie" after Operation Valkyrie, the plot's codename.
The main site of interest would be the "Bendlerblock" memorial inside the Defence Ministry complex in Berlin. This is where Stauffenberg and his co-conspirators hatched the plot and where he and his closest comrades were executed when it failed.
Kammerbauer said the ministry had not yet received official filming requests from the producers of "Valkyrie".
© Reuters 2007. All rights reserved.
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