American SniperBradley Cooper was good and about 88% believable as the Legend. The rest of the movie was typical Clint Eastwood fare. Clumsily and woodenly poking at heartstrings with a gnarled finger. Awkward pacing. Threads left dangling for no reason. Auxiliary topics opened but never explored. Gaps in reason and logic.
Where the movie lost me: Very badly done fake baby scene. Back at home, trying to deal with his second child and the thing passed from mom to dad was VERY obviously a doll. It was so bad, there are already countless posts about it. It's featured prominently in reviews. It was horrifically bad.
Cooper's performance aside, the film was just painfully flat and lifeless. I wanted to be moved. I wanted to be inspired. I wanted to feel the tension and be for good guys but Clint's direction sucked every bit of that out of me. I was never really given a reason to like Chris Kyle other than he was a twangy Texas boy who could aim a gun. It felt like every potential emotional mark was completely missed.
There were numerous throwaway sidebars... his brother, for one. "Fuck this place." Ok. Why? What was the natural exposition of that scene?
I was emotionally invested in Lone Survivor. I had a stake in each of the main characters. I got their pain and felt the rage and helplessness. That movie (whether or not it was 100% historically accurate) reached me on several levels. American Sniper kept me at arm's length for the most part. At times I felt like Eastwood was even a little conflicted, not really sure what story he wanted to tell.
---- SPOILER -----
If you know the story, you know that Chris was killed during the filming by a veteran he was trying to help. The damn fool shot him with his own gun at a shooting range and then stole his truck.
Without that coda? Without that sobering reality -- which, remember, was not even a part of the original story that was filmed? This would have been a substantially less powerful movie and one that would (to me, at least) barely resonate.
---- END SPOILER -----It's not Black Hawk Down. It's not Lone Survivor. It's not Saving Private Ryan, Full Metal Jacket or even Hurt Locker. It doesn't reach those heights.
Fake Baby: