The government’s refusal to permit filming at the place where von Stauffenberg worked and died led to controversy about whether Cruise’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 should not be playing one of the Nazi-era’s few heroes.

Government spokesman Albig said the decision to turn down director Bryan Singer’s request to shoot Valkyrie at the Bendler Block, now a memorial for Third Reich resistance fighters, had nothing to do with Cruise’s religion.

Stauffenberg’s son Berthold Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg has been quoted as saying by the Sueddeutsche Zeitung that "he should keep his fingers off my father", and adding that he feared the movie would be "terrible kitsch".

Stauffenberg and the other plotters of the July 20, 2020 assassination attempt were caught and executed after Hitler survived the explosion at his headquarters in what was then East Prussia. Valkyrie is scheduled for release in 2008.


TomKat to co-star? - July 6 2007
Tom Cruise is apparently keen to make Katie Holmes his leading lady and is lining up some plum film projects for her.

The Mission: Impossible star, who turned 45 this week, has apparently vowed to help get his wife’s career back on track by offering to produce her movies, reports the Daily Express.

"She’s not interested by many of the roles she is being offered so Tom has stepped in with some ideas of his own," a source close to the couple told the paper. "He has one project he wants both of them to star in and another he will produce with Katie in the lead."

It seems Mrs Cruise’s acting ambitions have taken a back seat since her whirlwind romance to Tom began in 2005, followed by the birth of baby Suri last year.

"Katie is a little disillusioned with acting at the moment, especially as she’s taken to being a mother so wholeheartedly," added the source.

Tom is no stranger to starring alongside an off-screen love interest. He appeared in three films with previous wife Nicole Kidman.


Anger over Cruise starring role as Hitler foe - June 27 2007
Two sensitive issues in Germany - the Nazi era and Scientology - have come together in a controversy over the production of a film in which Tom Cruise plays the country’s most famous anti-Hitler plotter.

Tom, one of Scientology’s best-known adherents, is to play Colonel Claus Graf Schenk von Stauffenberg, the aristocratic army officer executed after a failed attempt to assassinate Hitler in 1944, in director Bryan Singer’s new film Valkyrie.

The film’s German co-producers say they have initial permission to use the former German general staff headquarters in Berlin, where Stauffenberg worked and where he was executed by firing squad in the courtyard - and plan an historically accurate treatment.

But word that a Scientologist would play Stauffenberg has rubbed some in Germany the wrong way.

Germany’s government considers Scientology a commercial enterprise that takes advantage of vulnerable people, and critics maintain that one of its adherents should not be playing one of the Nazi-era’s few heroes.

Stauffenberg "is to be played by an actor whose sect, through dubious methods, attempts to lure people and make them pliable", Social Democratic MP Klaus Uwe Benneter said on his website.

"This is a slap in the face to all upstanding democrats, all resistance fighters during the Third Reich, and all victims of the Scientology sect."