American Sniper

A pleasantly unbiased, melancholic view of a man who was no great thinker, but who meant well. American Sniper does not glorify Chris Kyle, but rather makes him a sad victim of a cruel war and his own noble need to help others. I honestly admit that I was afraid that this would be the second Machine Gun Preacher, from which I was very sick the other day, but fortunately my fears were misplaced. Clint Eastwood also managed to keep most of the dangerous clichés lurking around the corner, and filmed the story with his usual coolly dispassionate naturalism. My only regret is that the film followed a template that I have seen many times before and that it is not a bit more exceptional in its treatment. But I didn't expect the ending (because I knew nothing about the real fate of the main character) and it really touched me. (29/05/2016)

Eastwood's precise shot, which is likely to be mistaken for pathos when defending the American way of thinking, stands out above all. This is due to the fact that, despite a significant part of the runtime being spent on the battlefield, it manages to retain a civilian atmosphere, rather giving Kyle's extraordinary "skill" lip service because, at his core, the protagonist remains that pure American redneck who, in Cooper's excellent, paunchy Texan delivery, blathers on about defending the country, and yet you know he means it with unapologetic sincerity; its length and the empty brothers storyline are the only things that the film can be faulted for. Even J. Edgar wanted to look like this. (19/01/2015)

Cooper aims high; he wants recognition and Oscars. And he obviously tempted Clint Eastwood into this with a high fee. Otherwise, Clint wouldn’t go for it, as the script doesn’t offer much space for his narrative talent (the emotional scenes with the wife could have been done by anyone). The simplicity and straightforwardness of the film, which does not bring anything new under the helmet and relies solely on the potential of the real Chris Kyle’s fate, will delight on one hand (the film engages viewers without imposing higher demands on them), but due to the use of all sorts of clichés and the absence of its own personality (which the identically construed but less oversimplified The Hurt Locker did have), it is not entitled to any Oscars. Unless the Academy intends to openly admit that it is more about politics than movies. The key action scene (Butcher + drill + boy) has masterful editing. But the second half of the movie needs to be shortened. (17/02/2015)

An extended mix of contemporary male cluelessness, declining machismo, and the search for idols. It's a real shame that Cooper's decidedly above-average acting flounders in a film where every five minutes is about something different, and individual scenes end where there should be a confrontation that could at least reveal the protagonist's questionable temperament. There's also not much else to do when you've got the national hero's dad up your ass, making sure the image of his deified son matches his Texas fantasies, and Republican zombie Eastwood behind the camera. The hero's wife is a devastating parody, who right in keeping with the optics of the Southern redneck occasionally threatens to pack up the kids if she doesn't get her way, but if you're able to actively ignore her, she'll still wait for you with open arms, because that's just how women are. It'll get rednecks across the breadth of the Confederate states to join the military, so it lived up to expectations, but otherwise it's a bigoted tunnel of shame that only scores points for Cooper's performance and not messing around, including with dying and tortured children. Arab children, rather. PS: formally it holds to certain standards and it's certainly not terrible. There's even a couple of delicious scenes (the storm in the desert), but next to the formal qualities of Green Zone, The Hurt Locker, Zero Dark Thirty, and The Kingdom, there’s absolutely no reason to add points for that. (24/06/2015)

Biography of the sniper from Texas, Chris Kyle, who had about 150 kills scratched into his rifle stock. Eastwood has become a hitmaker in his latter years (90 million views over one weekend!) and a very moderate war movie director. Not so many kills as such, they are restrained, realistic and not even Kyle is counting (he’s so cool). Probably because we all know what a farce Iraq was, there’s no delving into politics. Simply a classic pursuit movie with ragheads with a polite duel going on in the background. The picture pretends that sniping itself isn’t playing the main role, but in fact it’s a conflict with Mustafa and the hunt for Butcher that help the viewer differentiate between the separate tours. The classic development of the Navy Seals and is all too familiar, thank you very much Eastwood for presenting it in more entertaining form. Cooper is very convincing in his transformation from man to robot and back again, at crucial moments he doesn’t act like a hero, but like a psychopath. His dead soul is visible in his cold blue eyes (that’s why Kyle wears sunglasses almost all the time). Movies like Hurt Locker don’t have this, that’s probably why this movie works much better. Emotions come across artificial, but on the other hand the finale works well, sad, even though the main message becomes a little blurred. P.S.: I’m a great fan of the Punisher, so I seriously enjoyed the scene about the “graphic novel". The armor and magazines with the skull stencil looked damn good. Hooyah! (19/01/2015)