This movie seems to have no reason for existing except as an answer to the rhetorical question: "Do you think somebody nowadays could make an old-fashioned, straight-ahead submarine flick like the ones from World War II?" It's 1942 and the war is young, especially for United States forces. German U-boats are playing hob with Allied shipping and getting away with it, thanks to their unbreakable Enigma code. The officers and crew of the USS-33, a leaky rust-bucket left over from World War I, are yanked back from a 48-hour liberty with orders to put to sea. Joining them are a jut-jawed Marine commando (David Keith) and a shallow-faced git named Hirsch (Jake Weber), who mostly communicates in clipped German except for the announcement that he will be in operational control of the mission. That doesn't necessarily thrill the S-33's commander, Mike Dahlgren (Bill Paxton). We already know that executive officer Andrew Tyler (Matthew McConaughey) isn't thrilled, because he's just learned that his bid for a command of his own was torpedoed by none other than his C.O.
Is any of this new to you? If so, you may watch in fascination as the S-33 heads out to intercept U-571, which has been knocked about after attacking an Allied ship. S-33 — adorned with a swastika on its conning tower — will hope to be mistaken for a German resupply sub so that Hirsch & Co. can board U-571 and capture its Enigma decoder. Tyler, although barely less of a cipher than the other personnel in Mostow's story grid (Harvey Keitel as your generic Chief, T.C. Carson as a black mess-steward, Erik Palladino as an Italian-American wisecracker), will hope to be mistaken for a complex-enough character to undergo metamorphosis and become an officer worthy of a command assignment. Because, of course, he effectively gets one.
Forget about comparing U-571 to Das Boot. That modern classic told its story of Germans (not Nazis) — of men in war — so sympathetically, with such feeling for character and the literally and figuratively close bonding of submarine life, that audiences around the world embraced it. U-571 feels more like a 1943 war movie without the war to propagandise about (but with a shamelessly gung-ho martial music score). There's barely a line of dialogue that doesn't plant motivation, supply technical exposition, or elliptically hint at a species of crisis that we can be damn sure will arise before the film is over. That may sound like praise, and on a sheer housekeeping level it is. But in terms of viewer involvement, it's a wash. Nothing extra is allowed to seep in — no development of character for its own sake, no surprise except the periodic mechanical inversion of the terms of the suspense, and no down time to allow the movie's intended highs to really be high. The movie just keeps grinding along, pushing its way through a barrage of boom-boom and a sea of tight-lipped clichés.
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If you've never seen a submarine drama before, thenU-571will probably make a good ... more
impression as a tautly choreographed piece of entertainment. A strong cast led by Matthew McConaughey's sympathetic Lt. Tyler undertakes a perilous mission to seize a Ger...
Postage & Packaging: £1.21 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
If you've never seen a submarine drama before, thenU-571will probably make a good ... more
impression as a tautly choreographed piece of entertainment. A strong cast led by Matthew McConaughey's sympathetic Lt. Tyler undertakes a perilous mission to seize a Ger...
Postage & Packaging: £1.21 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
If you've never seen a submarine drama before, thenU-571will probably make a good ... more
impression as a tautly choreographed piece of entertainment. A strong cast led by Matthew McConaughey's sympathetic Lt. Tyler undertakes a perilous mission to seize a Ger...
Postage & Packaging: Free! Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours...
A U.S. Navy captain and his crew are just beginning to enjoy 48 hours of leave when they ... more
receive word to immediately return to duty. On a top-secret assignment they must disguise themselves as Nazis and infiltrate a severely damaged Nazi U-boat. Once ...
Postage & Packaging: £0.00 Availability: 3-5 working days
If you've never seen a submarine drama before, thenU-571will probably make a good ... more
impression as a tautly choreographed piece of entertainment. A strong cast led by Matthew McConaughey's sympathetic Lt. Tyler undertakes a perilous mission to seize a Ger...
Postage & Packaging: £1.21 Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours...
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Jul 10th, 2000
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