Movie Review: American Sniper

Clint Eastwood's latest film American Sniper-which is based on the life of Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, who has the most confirmed kills in the history of the United States military- has made all sorts of waves in the past week. Just a day before its nationwide expansion on January 16th, the film shockingly picked up 6 Academy Award nominations after getting next to no fanfare at every other major film award show. The film then went onto shatter the record for the highest all-time opening weekend for the month of January by racking up just shy of $90 million in its first three days of wide release. Since its release, the film has been the subject of many heated, heavily publicized debates about whether the film is slanderous pro-war propaganda celebrating the life of a soulless killer or the story of a true American hero who's worthy of being idolized.

All politics and judgements of Kyle's character aside, American Sniper fails miserably as a piece of art. The film is essentially a two-hour highlight reel of Kyle's kills. Kyle shooting people from afar and aiding with ground support on other missions without getting to truly know the man behind the gun. Screenwriter Jason Hall teases character depth in the sequences on American soil between Kyle's four tours with scenes that show Kyle being distant from his wife (Sienna Miller in a thankless role) or hearing a sound that flashes him back to something in the war. But instead of really following through on these moments of internal conflict and humanity, Hall chooses to head back to the battlefield for another extended round of dull, tension-free combat scenes. Hall simply doesn't have the guts to analyze the effects war had on Kyle with any sort of real depth and it makes this film incredibly frustrating to watch. Call me crazy, but if you make a biopic that contains literally no vital information that couldn't be found on the subject's Wikipedia page, you've failed miserably as filmmakers.

With an established director like Clint Eastwood at the helm, I'm legitimately shocked at just how empty this film is. Eastwood has made a career off making films (Unforgiven, Absolute Power) about reluctant gunslingers, who are forced to kill for noble reasons but regularly doubt whether or not they're doing the right thing. Aside from a couple of all too brief moments, Kyle doesn't wrestle with any of the moral questions that are surely raised on the battlefield. Given his history as a director and this film's focus on one man's life and not the events of an entire war, I expected Eastwood to delve headfirst into what makes Kyle tick and the effects combat had on him as a person. It's disappointing to see one of the boldest filmmakers in American cinema pull away from his roots in a film that desperately needed a heavy dose of his exploration of moral ambiguity.

The only reason American Sniper isn't a complete failure is Cooper's performance as Kyle. Cooper has proven himself to be one of Hollywood's most capable actors over the past few years and this is yet another impressive notch on his increasingly impressive resume. When the film takes those all too short breaks from the battlefield and lets Cooper sink his teeth into the character, American Sniper shows flashes of real potency. If the script allowed him a chance to properly convey the complexities of Kyle at length, the quality of this film would've skyrocketed. American Sniper is nothing but a massive missed opportunity that's completely unworthy of the accolades that are being bestowed upon it.

2/5 Stars