U-571 is a 2000 submarine film directed by Jonathan Mostow from a screenplay he co-wrote with Sam Montgomery and David Ayer. The film stars Matthew McConaughey, Bill Paxton, Harvey Keitel, Jon Bon Jovi, Jake Weber and Matthew Settle. The film follows a World War II German U-boat boarded by American submariners to capture her Enigma cipher machine.

Plot

In May 1942, during the Battle of the Atlantic, after sinking a British merchant ship, German U-boat U-571 has her engines badly damaged by depth charges from a British destroyer, with all of her engineers and mechanics killed in a flash fire. U-571 skipper Kapitänleutnant Günther Wassner makes a distress call that is intercepted by Allied intelligence. The US Navy has its submarine S-33 modified to resemble a German resupply U-boat in order to steal the Enigma machine coding device and sink the U-571. Before the crew of S-33 receives its assignment, the submarine's executive officer Lieutenant Tyler is unhappy about a recommendation for command of his own submarine being blocked by his commanding officer, Lieutenant Commander Dahlgren who tells Tyler that even though he has the qualifications, Tyler cannot make immediate, even questionable, orders without hesitation, which Dahlgren believes is a crucial quality that a submarine captain needs to have. The group are joined by Lt. Hirsch from Naval Intelligence who is fluent in German, who speaks with Radioman Wentz, also fluent in German due to his immigrant parents. A Marine named Coonan arrives loaded with high explosives.