Cruise film permitted at Berlin memorial

Sep 14, 2007, 17:38 GMT

Berlin - Berlin has relented from its location-shooting ban on a film starring Tom Cruise as a true-life 1944 German resistance hero, a defence ministry spokesman said Friday.

The federal government had previously ruled that an historic defence office building, the Bendler Block, and its public memorial to Count Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg could not be used for the movie Valkyrie.

That ban had followed an appeal by politicians to shut out Cruise because he advocates Scientology, a creed which Berlin considers anti-democratic. But Berlin insisted the only reason was that the memorial was too sacred.

Spokesman Thomas Raabe said Friday the German co-producers of Valkyrie had now met ministry concerns.

The film script would be changed to include a film sequence at the beginning showing the Stauffenberg memorial in the present day.

Stauffenberg and three other plotters were shot at the site as the July 20, 1944 bid to blow up Adolf Hitler in his Wolf's Lair headquarters failed.

Raabe said the added sequence, proposed by co-producers in a letter, would make a connection to today.

'It's a nice connection, showing that barbarity did not win,' he said. 'The film is going to show that a democratic Germany was resurrected.'

Cruise is playing Stauffenberg, the only major anti-Nazi hero in Second World War Germany. Filming has already begun at other locations and in studios near Berlin.

The mass-circulation newspaper Bild said the four scenes approved at the Bendler Block included rebel forces cordoning off their coup headquarters, followed by pro-Hitler forces attacking and seizing the building.

Stauffenberg and three other plotters would be shown being killed in the yard.

During World War II, the Bendler Block housed senior armed forces sections. The building was named after Bendler Street outside, now renamed after Stauffenberg.

Despite the government's denial that Cruise's creed had influenced the decision, German film industry figures mocked the ruling in July as intolerant.

Scientology was founded by a US science-fiction writer, L Ron Hubbard.

Some German commentators had previously suggested the real reason defence officials blocked the film was because they wanted to influence the script. The film company has won millions of euros in German film board subsidies.

Raabe said that members of the production team, memorial staff and defence officials had jointly toured the locations at the Bendler Block on Friday morning.

'It's a matter close to our hearts that only dignified things occur at this historic place,' he said. He said a final agreement on the arrangements might be reached next week.

United Artists, the studio making the movie, said in a statement Friday it was 'extremely grateful' for the permission to use the historic locations and would ensure their dignity was respected.

The German Finance Ministry, which oversees government property, meanwhile denied there had been any change of mind, saying it was the film that had changed.

Non-government figures continued to assail Cruise Friday and criticized the film clearance.

Frank Henkel, a state of Berlin Christian Democratic official, said he was appalled that 'a supporter of a totalitarian psycho organization is acting the hero of the German resistance against the Nazis.'