U-571

Cliff’s Notes for people who have never seen a submarine movie, made by people who couldn’t be bothered to do any real research. We meet our heroic crew of interchangeable cardboard-cutouts at a naval soiree, where the rules of fraternization have been suspended for the night, presumably so HQ only has to crash one party to gather its men. Their mission—secure a disabled U-boat in the North Atlantic and retrieve a clunky typewriter that will change the course of the war. Matthew McConaughey is passed over as mission commander for lacking the cojones to offer up blood sacrifice; Commander Bill Paxton, after passing this news, checks his watch to see how much longer he has in this movie (about 20 minutes). He gets off lucky. The rest of the crew (and the audience) must endure 90 minutes of sweaty, grimy faces, ricocheting bolts, gushing water, sonar booong . . . booong . . . booong, depth charge boom! boom! boom! The cheesiest CG of an exploding destroyer this side of a 75-cent video game finally ends the whole mess.