American Sniper Hits Theatres

Feature

By Josh Haight

Husky Herald Reporter

 American Sniper stars Bradley Cooper as Chris Kyle, a United States Navy SEAL sniper with a record for the most confirmed kills. It also stars Sienna Miller as his wife and is directed by Clint Eastwood.

 For a long time, Clint Eastwood was renowned as one of Hollywood’s greatest directors, with films like Unforgiven, Mystic River, Million Dollar Baby, and Gran Torino. Though those films are great, it seems he’s going through a directing dry-spell of sorts with films like Trouble with the Curve, Jersey Boys and, unfortunately, American Sniper.

 American Sniper is not a bad movie. In fact, it’s far from it.

 There are some definitely great things exhibited in this film. The acting by the two main stars is absolutely great.

 Bradley Cooper, well known for playing typecast handsome/charming roles makes a complete departure from any performance he’s ever given as a modest, patriotic Texan with a profound love of America. He truly made an effort to become this character through his weight gain, shift to a Southern accent, and giving an unrecognizable performance.       

 Sienna Miller gives a very emotional performance as Chris Kyle’s wife. And by emotional, I mean she cries a lot, so I guess she’s got that going for her.

 Characters are actually where this film begins to crumble a bit. We, as an audience, should care when a character dies or gets injured, but we don’t because they’re not developed enough for us to actually be invested.

 The only two characters that are developed to the caliber of a good film are those of Chris Kyle (Cooper) and his wife (Miller). And even then, Miller is the cardboard cutout of a crying military wife and Cooper is the cardboard cutout of a patriot hero.

 A good character development for the character of Chris Kyle is the expressions on his face when people call him hero. He actually shows doubt and confusion for these allegations and seems to doubt the morality of his actions, but hearing people constantly call him a hero gets ultimately frustrating after a period of two hours.

 I’m not saying that Chris Kyle wasn't a hero, didn't love his country, or didn't regret his actions as a sniper. I’m just saying that in the film, he’s portrayed as some perfect hero, person, husband and father, which definitely wasn't true at all because nobody is perfect.

 Sure the film tries to develop post-traumatic stress for Chris Kyle with sounds resembling to gunfire and melodramatic violence, but he’s not extremely affected by the events he experienced at war. This makes us care for the character significantly less because he seems so indifferent.

 In terms of technical aspects and production value for the film, it’s very well made. The cinematography for the film is absolutely gorgeous, the film sounds great in terms of both dialogue scenes and war scenes, the violence in those war scenes is very well choreographed and executed.

 Writing aspects, such as dialogue are also very well put together, with America scenes and war scenes seguing into each other with ease. The dialogue flows and keeps the audience immersed, even with exposition in the form of army lingo that not many people understand.

 The overall story of the film is relatively straight-forward. Chris Kyle is a patriot, he has a wife and kids back home, he has a life in the war, and those two lives are constantly at war with each other. I actually really liked this part to the film and I think that can be credited to the director, Clint Eastwood and the editors Joel Cox and Gary Roach.

 Overall, I felt American Sniper was a good film, not great, and had some definite flaws that overshadowed some really good acting, dialogue, editing and storytelling. Looking at this film from a superficial standpoint it’s very good, but it lacks the heart and down to earth feel that could have made it great.