U-571 ««
PG-13, 116m. 2000
Cast & Credits: Matthew McConaughey (Lt. Andrew Tyler), Bill Paxton (Lt. Cmdr. Mike Dahlgren), Harvey Keitel (CPO Henry Klough), Jon Bon Jovi (Lt. Pete Emmett), David Keith (Maj. Matthew Coonan). Screenplay by Jonathan Mostow, Sam Montgomery and David Ayer. Directed by Jonathan Mostow.
U-571 is nothing more than a repetitive cat-and-mouse game with a plot equivalent to a Tom and Jerry cartoon where a dumb, pesky, persistent cat named Tom chases a cute clever brown mouse named Jerry. The ending was always the same in practically every cartoon I saw (and I’ve only seen two or three cartoon shorts in my lifetime) with the feline being injured and the little rodent triumphantly escaping either capture or dinner.
The mouse running for its life in U-571 are American naval forces who take over a German U-boat while on a mission to retrieve an Enigma coding machine the Nazis use to send encrypted messages. The cat looming above them dropping dozens of depth charges, all of which explode stopping just short of the sub’s hull, cracking gauges and making pipes burst with sea water is the German destroyer refusing to give up the chase.
I find it embarrassing to compare U-571 to a cartoon but then again, U-571 is something only kids will enjoy just for all the explosions alone. I see it as a popcorn movie in the sense I don’t have to think while watching it. I could just sit back and marvel at how the visual effects cause the theater floors to shake under my feet and how my ears are left with a ringing noise; the result of the auditorium’s state of the art sound system.
There were only so many scenes I could take watching dozens of depth charges float near the sub and detonate before I started looking at my watch. I’ll admit I was in suspense when that first set was dropped wondering if one might just pierce the hull. None ever did.
As the second and third sets descended, my mind drifted to the concern I had for those German sailors stuck at the bottom of the ocean in director Wolfgang Petersen’s claustrophobic, four-hour World War II epic, Das Boot (1981). I cared more about the welfare of that Nazi crew than I did for this brave, heroic bunch in U-571 led by Lt. Andrew Tyler (Matthew McConaughey).
A great number of Tyler’s men are scared. I suppose I would be too if I were on a mission that goes wrong, had to be led by an untried first officer and were inside a German sub, of which I had no idea how to operate because the directions are in German. The film has an interesting premise but it only goes so far as the first hour. The word that best sums up the U-571 is predictable.
A few of the cast members make their exits early like Bill Paxton (Titanic – 1997) who plays Tyler’s executive officer Lt. Dalhgren whose two major scenes are at a party where he tells Tyler their crew has been chosen for a mission. His other big scene happens shortly before they reach the German sub where he tells Tyler the reason he didn’t recommend him for a command is because of his unwillingness to sacrifice lives in an attempt to save others.
Then there’s David Keith, whose most memorable role and perhaps his best, was playing Richard Gere’s navy buddy in the romantic drama, An Officer and a Gentleman (1982). Here, he plays a special ops agent in charge of training Tyler’s crew to be “Marine fighting men.” Keith hasn’t been in a lot of notable movies since 1982. I wasn’t the least bit surprised to see his character killed off so soon in U-571.
Nor was I surprised to see crew members silently chat with each other asking whether they think Tyler can lead them to safety and officers yelling at one another to “Fire” the minute they see a Nazi warplane in the air.
I knew, for example, that one of the Germans the Americans take hostage wouldn’t help them try to operate the boat. The script, co-written by director Jonathan Mostow, Sam Montgomery and David Ayer provide this character with only one purpose; release himself from captivity and kill an American officer before he himself is shot. I knew, despite the fact the German sub had only one torpedo that sooner or later, they’d use it to knock out the German destroyer. This was followed by that emotional musical score where the engineer (Harvey Keitel) tells Tyler he’ll gladly serve with him on any command he gets.
Then just when I thought the movie could offer nothing interesting, the film ended on an intriguing note listing a number of submarine missions supposedly carried out by British forces. Some of which took place before President Roosevelt announced our entering the war immediately after the bombing of Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7. 1941. None of those missions listed were carried out by American forces.
The actual German Enigma machine was taken from U-110 in May 1941 by British forces according to a May 26, 2000 column written by Washington Post writer, T.R. Reid, in the Arts and Entertainment section of The Dallas Morning News.
This is the problem with historical movies today like U-571 my dad said in response to two upcoming pictures; one retelling the Japanese attack in Hawaii, appropriately named Pearl Harbor, due in theaters Memorial Day 2001. The other will be about the Cuban Missile Crisis as seen through the eyes of Kennedy aide Ken O’Donnell (Kevin Costner) in Thirteen Days due out this December.
The pictures my dad remembered seeing back in the 1970s like Tora, Tora, Tora (1970) and Missiles of October (1974) didn’t twist history the way Hollywood does or will do today (except in the movie 1776 (1972) where people sang about passing the Declaration of Independence) in future projects. Today, pictures made by director Oliver Stone can make viewers believe everyone killed JFK and that Pat Nixon really did ask Tricky Dick for a divorce. They can also make people believe it was American forces who got the German Enigma machine and helped win the war when it was, in fact, the British.
I don’t disagree. The difference is I don’t accept anything Hollywood makes as history. I accept such films as entertainment. If I want to learn the real story, I’ll read a book on the subject or take a history class. A lot of movies based on past events today are what I call “half-truths.”
U-571, however, is not so much a half-truth as it is a big lie disguised as an expensive action adventure movie with a lot of special effects.
©4/21/00
PG-13, 116m. 2000
Cast & Credits: Matthew McConaughey (Lt. Andrew Tyler), Bill Paxton (Lt. Cmdr. Mike Dahlgren), Harvey Keitel (CPO Henry Klough), Jon Bon Jovi (Lt. Pete Emmett), David Keith (Maj. Matthew Coonan). Screenplay by Jonathan Mostow, Sam Montgomery and David Ayer. Directed by Jonathan Mostow.
The mouse running for its life in U-571 are American naval forces who take over a German U-boat while on a mission to retrieve an Enigma coding machine the Nazis use to send encrypted messages. The cat looming above them dropping dozens of depth charges, all of which explode stopping just short of the sub’s hull, cracking gauges and making pipes burst with sea water is the German destroyer refusing to give up the chase.
I find it embarrassing to compare U-571 to a cartoon but then again, U-571 is something only kids will enjoy just for all the explosions alone. I see it as a popcorn movie in the sense I don’t have to think while watching it. I could just sit back and marvel at how the visual effects cause the theater floors to shake under my feet and how my ears are left with a ringing noise; the result of the auditorium’s state of the art sound system.
There were only so many scenes I could take watching dozens of depth charges float near the sub and detonate before I started looking at my watch. I’ll admit I was in suspense when that first set was dropped wondering if one might just pierce the hull. None ever did.
As the second and third sets descended, my mind drifted to the concern I had for those German sailors stuck at the bottom of the ocean in director Wolfgang Petersen’s claustrophobic, four-hour World War II epic, Das Boot (1981). I cared more about the welfare of that Nazi crew than I did for this brave, heroic bunch in U-571 led by Lt. Andrew Tyler (Matthew McConaughey).
A great number of Tyler’s men are scared. I suppose I would be too if I were on a mission that goes wrong, had to be led by an untried first officer and were inside a German sub, of which I had no idea how to operate because the directions are in German. The film has an interesting premise but it only goes so far as the first hour. The word that best sums up the U-571 is predictable.
A few of the cast members make their exits early like Bill Paxton (Titanic – 1997) who plays Tyler’s executive officer Lt. Dalhgren whose two major scenes are at a party where he tells Tyler their crew has been chosen for a mission. His other big scene happens shortly before they reach the German sub where he tells Tyler the reason he didn’t recommend him for a command is because of his unwillingness to sacrifice lives in an attempt to save others.
Then there’s David Keith, whose most memorable role and perhaps his best, was playing Richard Gere’s navy buddy in the romantic drama, An Officer and a Gentleman (1982). Here, he plays a special ops agent in charge of training Tyler’s crew to be “Marine fighting men.” Keith hasn’t been in a lot of notable movies since 1982. I wasn’t the least bit surprised to see his character killed off so soon in U-571.
Nor was I surprised to see crew members silently chat with each other asking whether they think Tyler can lead them to safety and officers yelling at one another to “Fire” the minute they see a Nazi warplane in the air.
I knew, for example, that one of the Germans the Americans take hostage wouldn’t help them try to operate the boat. The script, co-written by director Jonathan Mostow, Sam Montgomery and David Ayer provide this character with only one purpose; release himself from captivity and kill an American officer before he himself is shot. I knew, despite the fact the German sub had only one torpedo that sooner or later, they’d use it to knock out the German destroyer. This was followed by that emotional musical score where the engineer (Harvey Keitel) tells Tyler he’ll gladly serve with him on any command he gets.
Then just when I thought the movie could offer nothing interesting, the film ended on an intriguing note listing a number of submarine missions supposedly carried out by British forces. Some of which took place before President Roosevelt announced our entering the war immediately after the bombing of Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7. 1941. None of those missions listed were carried out by American forces.
The actual German Enigma machine was taken from U-110 in May 1941 by British forces according to a May 26, 2000 column written by Washington Post writer, T.R. Reid, in the Arts and Entertainment section of The Dallas Morning News.
This is the problem with historical movies today like U-571 my dad said in response to two upcoming pictures; one retelling the Japanese attack in Hawaii, appropriately named Pearl Harbor, due in theaters Memorial Day 2001. The other will be about the Cuban Missile Crisis as seen through the eyes of Kennedy aide Ken O’Donnell (Kevin Costner) in Thirteen Days due out this December.
The pictures my dad remembered seeing back in the 1970s like Tora, Tora, Tora (1970) and Missiles of October (1974) didn’t twist history the way Hollywood does or will do today (except in the movie 1776 (1972) where people sang about passing the Declaration of Independence) in future projects. Today, pictures made by director Oliver Stone can make viewers believe everyone killed JFK and that Pat Nixon really did ask Tricky Dick for a divorce. They can also make people believe it was American forces who got the German Enigma machine and helped win the war when it was, in fact, the British.
I don’t disagree. The difference is I don’t accept anything Hollywood makes as history. I accept such films as entertainment. If I want to learn the real story, I’ll read a book on the subject or take a history class. A lot of movies based on past events today are what I call “half-truths.”
U-571, however, is not so much a half-truth as it is a big lie disguised as an expensive action adventure movie with a lot of special effects.
©4/21/00
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