Cruise begins shooting controversial German movie
Shooting began today in a forest outside Berlin of a film starring Tom Cruise as Germany's most famous anti-Hitler plotter.
The German government said it was letting the 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 this Saturday, was off limits, said government spokesman Torsten Albig, citing "the dignity of the place".
Work went ahead as planned, with the movie set cordoned off with yellow-and-black plastic tape in a pine forest near the village of Klein Koeris, 43 miles south of Berlin. The German producers, Studio Babelsberg, confirmed Cruise was on the set.
The country's largest newspaper, Bild, printed pictures of the star - sporting a pair of dark sunglasses, a grey jacket and jeans - as he left a silver Audi A6 at Berlin's Tempelhof airport to get on a helicopter, that, according to Bild, took him to the set.
Several papers also ran pictures of a Second World War-vintage Ju-52 military transport plane with swastikas painted on the tail, saying it was used during the shooting.
The German 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.
"We granted all permissions but the one, for the Bendlerblock - because the dignity of this place should not be violated," government spokesman Torsten Albig said. "These circumstances show that the religious beliefs of the actor are without relevance."
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, 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.
Germany's federal agency that tracks extremism has kept Scientology under observation on allegations that it "threatens the peaceful democratic order" of the country.
The Scientologists have battled to end the surveillance, saying it is an abuse of their right to freedom of religion, and the US State Department regularly criticises Germany in its annual Human Rights Report for the practice.
'Valkyrie' is scheduled for release in 2008.
