I guess now I can stop holding my breath. The reality is I had no idea what I would think of American Sniper when I saw it. The critic that I myself follow, Moviebob, absolutely hated it; then it was nominated for Best Picture. So what did I ultimately think? I'm gonna lean toward the positive on this one. It's not perfect, but enough of it works well. By now I'm pretty sure all of you know the story of American Sniper. It's about Chris Kyle, a sniper that is considered the most lethal sniper in American history. The film itself is pretty straightforward, tracking from his early life to much later within it. For the most part it holds together, but I think it's really right for the wrong reasons. This is because the film's dropping points are quite mediocre, yet when it picks up you can really tell, almost the the point where you could excuse the lulls. And when the film is firing on all cylinders (pun intended) it was really good. The best parts of this film were its action sequences. Frankly, they reminded me a lot of Black Hawk Down. Clint Eastwood's eye for military action seems very similar to Ridley Scott's, and this is good because Sniper provides intense sequences just as the aforementioned Down did. I was really happy about this because this makes for great scenes, his highlight being one where Kyle alerts an enemy militia to the position of his crew by taking a shot and his crew has to fend for themselves. It's really a fantastic scene. Also in the favor of American Sniper are the performances. Bradley Cooper is not at his best here ( So much better in Silver Linings Playbook), but once the film kicks in so does his performance. Sienna Miller does good work, but her role was tragically minor and I dare say unimportant for at least the most part. But again, there are dropping points. These mainly come in the first 30-45 minutes of the film. The editing in this part isn’t phenomenal, and while the actors try to make it convincing it just isn't. Unfortunately, this is the time whenever Kyle meets his wife. The dialogue just doesn't really work here, and that's actually not as much of a problem because I honestly just kind of ignored that Frankly, the Best Picture nomination made me give this one the benefit of the doubt. I am actually most disappointed in the the fact that the film just doesn't have that much emotion to it other than the intensity of the action scenes. I felt a little bad for the guy’s family, but not really that much. Then again, the same thing was going on in Black Hawk Down, and in case you haven't noticed I love that movie. Wrapping up, I liked American Sniper mostly for it's action. If it were simply this intense action with none of the human element to it, it probably would have made for a tighter, more intense film. To be blunt, any human interaction that wasn’t murder was emotionless, cold, and detached, making it hard to relate to any character or be moved by the plot. I give American Sniper an 8 out of 10.
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December 2017
CategoriesAuthorHello welcome to FilmAnalyst. My name is Stephen Tronicek, and I really like movies. This is a way to get my opinions out to people. Thank you for visiting. |