U-571
The Sub Goes Deep, the Movie Does Not

By Keith R. Higgons
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Well kids, Hollywood has yet again sunk a filmmaker with potential. U-571 writer/director Jonathan Mostow wrote and directed the 1997 Kurt Russell hit Breakdown, an exciting and suspenseful film. His follow-up is this year's U-571, a severe disappointment from a filmmaker who showed such promise only three years ago.

U-571 has an able cast: Matthew McConaughey, Harvey Keitel (we're in luck: no full frontal shots this time), Bill Paxton, T.C. Carson, and Jake Weber. Sadly, Bill Paxton is stiffer than a two-by-four in this role, and whoever decided to cast Jon Bon Jovi should be whacked with a very stiff two-by-four indeed. There's a supporting cast, too. They'd be right at home on "Dawson's Creek."

The film also has an able crew: Mostow, director of photography Oliver Wood (Face/Off), and production designers William Ladd Skinner (12 Monkeys) and Gotz Weidner (The Never Ending Story 2). So what's the problem? Simply put, the script.

Mostow, his Breakdown co-writer Sam Montgomery, and retired Navy officer David Ayer wrote U-571. Perhaps it was a case of too many cooks spoiling the broth. Then again, since Mostow and Montgomery gave us Breakdown, perhaps the problem was hiring a retired military officer as a screenwriter instead of, say, a technical advisor. The story these men created is contrived, boring, and horribly clichéd. We meet our protagonists, who are on a secret mission to capture a stranded German sub. On board the sub is the mysterious Enigma machine, a valuable top-secret coding device. The good guys need the Enigma so they can, you know, stop losing the war.

Although solid effects technology was used freely, apparently solid storytelling and dialogue got shelved. Who could forget such lines as "She's old, but she'll hold!" and "Please don't tell the other guys I'm half German. They'd hate me!" (This particular line, incidentally, is spoken by radio Ensign Wentz. Apparently the other guys have been assuming 'Wentz' is Canadian.) In addition to stale dialogue, we are given heaping helpings of creaky war-movie tropes: the sub dives beyond its capability, bolts fly around as a result of the pressure, and of course there are plenty of leaky and rusty pipes.

Watching U-571, you always know where it is headed, even when you stop caring. If you want to see by-the-book linear filmmaking, here it is. And if you want to make a simple, linear film, go right ahead - just give me some characters I'll want to watch. In U-571, none of the characters are developed enough to make me care about them. Like the lines they speak, they come across as hastily-sketched clichés. You've got the street kid, the newlywed, the naïve one, and of course the token black guy (in what is essentially a servant's role).

The action is really the only thing worth watching, as it provided all of the suspense. That's faint praise, though, because in my book action movies work best when you have action, story, and characters. U-571 has the action and that is all. I felt nothing for the characters as they were going through their mission, although I must admit it was sorta fun to see Jon Bon Jovi get his head blown off.

So is U-571 a total waste? Well, it does have great action sequences, which is a cardinal rule of formulaic blockbuster action movies. It also has pretty faces, which is another essential component of a seat-filler. I'm just sorry to see a promising director making a formulaic action movie in the first place. Some of the blame for this undoubtedly rests on the producers and the studio, the folks who hand out the directives and control the purse strings. Maybe they thought U-571 was a truly great script, in which case they're dumb. Or perhaps they didn't care, figuring that audiences are dumb enough to go for the action alone. Well, sirs, this audience member is standing up and walking out. Action's fine, but you've got to back it up with the script. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go rent Das Boot, which really is a great submarine action movie.