By Leon Mangasarian

July 20 (Bloomberg) — The grandson of a German anti-Nazi hero, who’s played by Tom Cruise in a film being shot near Berlin, has been given a cameo role in the movie.

Cruise, 45, is playing Claus Schenk Count von Stauffenberg, who was executed in 1944 after a failed bid to kill Adolf Hitler. Philipp von Schulthess, 34, a son of Stauffenberg’s youngest daughter Konstanze, will play a military officer in the film “Valkyrie,” according to Petra Schwuchow from the LimeLight PR agency, which is representing the film in Berlin.

“The grandson has been given a small role as an adjutant,” Schwuchow said in a telephone interview today. (Source: Bloomberg)

Plotter’s grandson cast in Hitler movie with Tom Cruise

Potsdam, Germany – Germany’s Stauffenberg family has broken ranks over a controversial true-life movie in which Tom Cruise is to depict their ancestor who tried to kill Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler, with a family member playing a role in the film. The production company said Friday that Philipp von Schulthess, who is a grandson of Count Claus von Stauffenberg, would play the role of a 1944 German Army adjutant in the film Valkyrie, which began shooting this week.

It was not known Friday how Schulthess came to be in the cast, but it appeared he had attended an audition.

Studio Babelsberg also disclosed that Hitler would be played by British actor David Bamber, who played a Bob Geldof look-alike in the movie I Am Bob earlier this year.

The production company said Cruise was present during the second day of filming. (Source: Earth Times)

By KIRSTEN GRIESHABER, Associated Press Writer Thu Jul 19, 6:46 PM ET

BERLIN – Shooting began Thursday in a forest outside Berlin on a movie starring Tom Cruise as Germany’s most famous anti-Hitler plotter. The German government said it was letting filmmakers shoot anywhere they requested, except the former German general staff headquarters.

The so-called Bendler Block, where Col. Claus Graf Schenk von Stauffenberg was executed by firing squad 63 years ago Saturday, was off-limits, said government spokesman Torsten Albig, citing “the dignity of the place.”

Cruise plays Stauffenberg in “Valkyrie,” directed by Bryan Singer.

The movie set was cordoned off with yellow-and-black plastic tape in a pine forest near the village of Klein Koeris, 43 miles south of Berlin. Studio Babelsberg, the film’s German producers, confirmed that Cruise was on the set.

The government’s refusal to permit filming where Stauffenberg worked and died led to controversy about whether the 45-year-old actor’s religious beliefs had triggered the decision.

Cruise is one of Scientology’s best-known members. The German government considers Scientology a commercial enterprise that takes advantage of vulnerable people, and some critics maintain that one of its adherents shouldn’t be playing one of the Nazi-era’s few heroes.

Albig said the decision not to allow filming at the Bendler Block, now a memorial for Third Reich resistance fighters, had nothing to do with Cruise’s religion.

“We granted all permissions but the one, for the Bendler Block — because the dignity of this place should not be violated,” Albig said Thursday. “These circumstances show that the religious beliefs of the actor are without relevance.”

Stauffenberg and the other plotters of the July 20, 1944, assassination attempt were caught and executed after Hitler survived the explosion at his headquarters in what was then East Prussia.

“I can’t imagine shooting it anywhere else but on location in Germany, and I’m thrilled that we were able to get Tom Cruise to play Col. Stauffenberg,” Singer said in a statement released Thursday by the Babelsberg studio, which is co-producing the film with United Artists Entertainment LLC. The studio didn’t comment on the controversy. (Source: Yahoo)

BERLIN (Reuters) – Vintage World War Two aircraft bearing swastikas and other Nazi symbols flew low over the German village of Loepten near Berlin Sunday, but local residents had been warned in advance — it was for a film.

The planes were being used to film a segment of Hollywood thriller “Valkyrie,” starring Tom Cruise. He plays German army Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, who was executed after a failed attempt to assassinate Hitler in 1944.

Pictures taken by locals of the planes flying at low altitude over the village were published in Bild newspaper on Monday. “The residents were warned about possible noise,” it quoted Mayor Friedrich Schoenfeld as saying.

It is illegal to display Nazi symbols in public in Germany, although filmmakers and theatrical companies are exempted.

Tom Cruise’s new film “Valkyrie,” the MGM/United Artists historical thriller that kicked up dust last month in Germany, now has a tentative release date: Aug. 8, 2008.

Cruise, who is also one of the film’s producers, stars at Col. Claus von Stauffenberg, the leader of a July 1944 attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler with a briefcase bomb. Valkyrie was the code name for Stauffenberg’s plot.

A studio spokeswoman said the film’s release date could change, but she said an alternative hadn’t been determined.

The film will have plenty of competition in August if that date holds.

Universal’s “Hellboy 2” and Buena Vista’s animated feature “South of the Border” are due out on Aug. 1. New Line’s Brendan Fraser adventure “Journey 3-D,” Warner Bros.’ “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2” and Sony’s Seth Rogen comedy “The Pineapple Express” are all set to release on Aug. 8.

Last month, Germany barred “Valkyrie” filmmakers from shooting at the “Bendlerblock” memorial inside the Defense Ministry complex in Berlin because Cruise is a Scientologist. The government considers Scientology a cult. (LATimes.com)

Berlin – A replica of Adolf Hitler’s secret wartime HQ was being built near Berlin Wednesday with just a week to go before filming of a controversial Tom Cruise movie begins, a civic official said. Cruise is to play the chief plotter in the true story about a vain bid to assassinate Hitler with a bomb in 1944.

The film team have been banned from the Berlin building where the plotter, Count Claus von Stauffenberg, was executed by Nazi firing squad.

Officially this is because of fears that filming would lower the dignity of a memorial.

But German politicians had earlier assailed Cruise, 45, over his advocacy of Scientology and demanded such a ban. Scientology is suspected by many Germans of being anti-democracy.

US commentators, cinema industry leaders and part of the media have attacked the ban, insisting Cruise’s beliefs have no relevance to his role in director Bryan Singer’s movie Valkyrie.

Stauffenberg put a bomb under a table in a building at the Wolf’s Lair, Hitler’s secret base in the woods near what is Ketrzyn in contemporary Poland. But Hitler survived the blast and within days many of those involved in the plot on his life were rounded up.

The scene was being recreated in woods at Gross Koeris, 50 kilometres south-east of downtown Berlin.

Reporters were unable to see the set, with the site sealed off by private security teams, roadblocks and kilometres of red-and-white tape.

Filming, partly funded by a German government grant, is scheduled to begin July 19, according to Ulrich Arnts, chief executive of the Schenkenlaendchen district administration.

Stauffenberg is revered in Germany as a national hero for his July 20, 1944 bid to kill Hitler, but leading German journalist Frank Schirrmacher has pointed out that the count had anti-democratic beliefs.

Studio Babelsberg, the German movie studio which is co-producing Valkyrie, declined to give details of the script.

Its deputy chief executive, Christoph Fisser, said “Cruise views Stauffenberg as a hero and will play him that way.” He said script had been carefully researched.

Reporters say Cruise has already been sighted in Berlin. City newspapers say a huge suite was created in a luxury downtown hotel specially for Cruise and wife Katie Holmes. Film publicists decline to confirm this.

In Schenkenlaendchen, Arnts said two other nearby locations were also being prepared for filming: A former East German Air Force reserve airfield and an area of recently burned-over forest.

At the airfield at Loepten, warning signs said only that the airfield would be in use for takeoffs and landings and there was no word of filming.

The project, reportedly also starring Kenneth Branagh, Carice van Houten, Thomas Kretschmann, Christian Berkel and Tom Wilkinson, is reported to be costing 80 million euros. (Source: Earth Times)

Tue Jul 10, 10:16 AM ET

BERLIN (AFP) – Tom Cruise received backing Tuesday for his contested plans to play the mastermind behind a daring bid to assassinate Adolf Hitler from one of the real-life hero’s fellow conspirators.

Philipp Freiherr von Boeselager, 89, told the German daily Bild that the uproar in Germany over the Hollywood star’s links to the Church of Scientology in no way disqualified him to play Count Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg.

“I think it is good that Cruise is playing Stauffenberg,” Boeselager said in an interview to be printed Wednesday.

“He is a good actor. But he must not be allowed to advertise for Scientology with the movie.”

Filming is to begin next week in Berlin on “Valkyrie,” named after the code name of the plot.

But the city authorities have restricted where the crew can film and some German officials have expressed discomfort with the idea of Cruise, a dedicated Scientologist, playing a national hero and martyr.

Germany considers the Scientology movement a commercial operation that exploits vulnerable people.

Boeselager belonged to Stauffenberg’s cadre of aristocratic military officers who conspired to kill Hitler in 1944.

The group planted a bomb under a table in Hitler’s eastern headquarters in East Prussia.

But the Nazi leader escaped with slight injuries because an officer had moved the briefcase containing the explosives behind a sturdy leg of the oak table.

Stauffenberg was rounded up that night and executed by firing squad along with other officers at the Bendlerblock, then the army headquarters in Berlin and now a memorial to the German resistance.

Boeselager, who had acquired the explosives used in the attacks, said he believed the Hollywood thriller had an important message to send to international audiences.

“I hope that the German resistance will become more well-known thanks to the film. People know so little about it in the United States.”

In Germany, the group is under observation by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution and several state security watchdogs.

But it is no longer being monitored by the Berlin authorities after a successful court challenge by the group.

The US-based Church of Scientology is also regarded with suspicion in European countries such as France and Belgium.

“Valkyrie” is directed by Bryan Singer and co-written by Christopher McQuarrie, the team behind the Oscar-winning 1995 thriller “The Usual Suspects”. (Source: Yahoo)

Washington, July 5 (ANI): Director Ken Russell has taken a swipe at Germany’s Defence Ministry for banning Scientologist actor Tom Cruise from filming ‘Valkyrie’ at military sites.

The film is about Claus Schenk Graf Von Stauffenberg who led the Operation Valkyrie assassination plot that tried to kill Adolf Hitler in 1944.

Cruise has been turned down by the Finance Ministry to shoot the film at a Defence Ministry building, Bendlerblock, in Berlin.

The iconoclastic director insisted that the officials are unnecessarily bringing in the actor’s personal beliefs and are forgetting that he is working so hard to make a film on the German hero.

“It seems stretching it to make Cruise take the flak for his philosophy of choice while he seeks, with all sincerity and a huge amount of resources, to promote Germany’s favourite son. Give the guy a break,” Contactmusic quoted Russell, as saying.

Russell quipped that Hollywood actors are known as ‘eccentric and daredevil weirdos’, so Scientology should not be hyped so much.

“Everybody knows Hollywood types are eccentric and daredevil weirdos, don’t they? Where’s the news in that?” he added.

Reports had earlier said that the Scientology wary country had banned Cruise from filming the thriller at German military sites due to his religion.

UA chief exec Paula Wagner in a statement however insisted that Cruise’s ‘personal beliefs have absolutely no bearing’ on the movie.

Cruise is set to play Stauffenberg in the film, who planted a bomb in a briefcase near Hitler at his military headquarters in Rastenburg on July 20, 1944, but while the bomb exploded and killed several officers, Hitler himself narrowly escaped death, thanks to a large oak table in the room that saved him.

Stauffenberg was caught and executed that night at Bendlerblock, as were 7,000 other sympathizers. (ANI) (Source: Yahoo India)

Read the entire article here.

By Erik Kirschbaum
Thu Jul 5, 8:29 AM ET

BERLIN (Reuters) – A German film fund said on Thursday it will grant subsidies worth 4.8 million euros ($6.5 million) for a controversial new film in which Tom Cruise plays a German hero executed for trying to kill Hitler.

Despite a row about the film’s thwarted efforts to use a memorial site where the Nazis shot Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, the German Federal Film Fund (DFFF), administered by the Federal Film Board (FFA), has endorsed the subsidy.

“Yes, it’s been approved,” said Christine Berg, DFFF project head at the FFA. “The application was submitted, the criteria for the grant were fulfilled and the project was approved.”

The subsidies are available to any film as long as a German-based producer is involved and certain percentages of the costs fall in Germany.

The grant, from a new 60 million euro annual subsidy budget set up this year, exceeds the total cost of most German films.

One of the officials said the grant should allay fears that Germany is fundamentally opposed to Cruise playing Stauffenberg because of the actor’s membership of Scientology.

The government regards Scientology as a cult masquerading as a religion to make money, a view its leaders reject.

Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung has said the filmmakers cannot shoot at any military sites as long as Cruise plays the lead role, and Stauffenberg’s eldest son had said he does not want Cruise to portray his father.

However the Finance Ministry, which controls state properties, has said filming is generally banned at the “Bendlerblock” — the site of the conspirators’ execution and now a national shrine within the Defense Ministry complex — because of a bad experience with a German filmmaker.

“Valkyrie” — named after the plot’s codename — is due to begin filming at locations in Berlin on July 18. The film is being directed by Bryan Singer and due for release in 2008.

Stauffenberg and his co-conspirators were shot after failing to kill Hitler with a briefcase bomb on July 20, 1944. (Source: Yahoo)