American Sniper: FR Review, Thoughts, etc. (SPOILERS INCL.)

Rabidralph and FR | Jan. 31, 2015 | Rabidralph

[rabidralph]

When American Sniper went into wide release, I promised to get a thread going, after a few weeks, so that FReepers could have a discussion about the movie, Hollywood, the effect of the story on us as veterans and civilians and whatever else.

I hope that most of FR has had a chance to see it. There will probably be spoilers in this discussion.

[rabidralph]

I have not read the book because I loaned it out and haven’t gotten it back, but I was surprised that Kyle took on the house-to-house duties, as well. He truly led by example.

[rabidralph]

Thankfully, the public is “punishing” the movie with millions of dollars at the box office. I think the producers and Mrs. Kyle will take that.

[rabidralph]

Here's a review of the movie from the Hollywood Reporter site. This review is from November, before all the big publicity and box office. Yes, spoilers.

[rabidralph]

Another source for a T-shirt, if you want one. Forged.com originally sold The Legend T-shirts to raise money for Mrs. Kyle after Ventura's lawsuit went onward.

[Cementjungle]

It's incredible (and frightening) to see how effective the left-wing media is in influencing the minds of the left in this country.

I've been following some threads on a photography site, and just in the past few days people there have managed to form opinions about the film (despite their vows to never ever go see it). They now see it as a massive propaganda piece, designed by a radical extremist right-wing senile director with the aim of convincing people that the evil Iraq war really wasn't the biggest series of war crimes in the history of the planet.

[rabidralph]

Yep. I’m a regular reader of Cinematography magazine online and there’s not been a single peep about the movie. They did choose to profile Unbroken, probably because of Roger Deakins’ long and distinguished career, but the silence is curious. Another popular site, filmmakerIQ.com usually does stories on big box office movies in current release but they don’t have anything about American Sniper either. Maybe they’ll jump on the bandwagon by summer.

[rabidralph]

Correction: American Cinematographer magazine.

[shortstop]

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Thankfully, the public is “punishing” the movie with millions of dollars at the box office. I think the producers and Mrs. Kyle will take that.

Yes, I think the director - Clint Eastwood - and the producer - Clint Eastwood - will both take that. And Mrs. Kyle, as well.

But of course “millions” doesn’t describe it and wouldn’t cut it, either.

It’s hundreds of millions of dollars in this case.

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

Saw the movie last nite, liked it a lot, high rating for ease of suspending disbelief.

But it has to be said that in the all-male settings the dialogue is, shall we say, uninhibited. Entirely realistic in that way . . .

[conservatism_IS_compassion]

I’m leery of going to the movies in general; probably could number the movies my wife and I have seen together on my fingers and toes - I’m not even sure about needing the toes.

But we went to this one, and weren’t sorry.

[rabidralph]

Yes, hundreds of millions of dollars. It truly gladdens my heart to see this. And I don't even want to couch it in political terms. This is an American movie about what our armed forces sacrifice every day. It's just that the story concerns the worst-case scenario of the early combat days of the war: Fallujah, Sadr City and other things that drove us all crazy at first.

Another FReeper on another Am. Sniper thread mentioned that all the gun ranges would have guys firing their rifles at 200 yards-plus for a while. Well, every law-abiding American should be able to make 4MOA at 200-500 yards. That is our heritage.

[Fiji Hill]

I just saw American Sniper, and it is, indeed, a great film. It's a lot better than Selma, which I saw yesterday and which I found boring and historically inaccurate.

[Future Snake Eater]

Wife and I just got back from seeing it. Terrific film. It really made me “feel it” again. I honestly forgot I was watching Bradley Cooper for most of the film, he just seemed like a guy in uniform doing his best to kick ass in that lovely country.

It also made me hate liberals even more. Their ridiculous complaints about the movie and its message show how shallow and pointless their thinking and lives are. No human could watch that scene with “The Butcher” and his drill on that kid and not agree with Kyle’s “savages” assessment. Yet many liberals apparently do.

[JoeFromSidney]

My wife and I saw AMERICAN SNIPER together. We both thought it was great. By all means, see it.

My wife's previous husband (God rest his soul) was a WW II veteran. She said the movie gave her a better understanding of what that man went through in Europe, fighting every inch of the way from the Channel coast to Germany.

[rabidralph]

I'm glad you decided to give Eastwood another chance :-)

How does it compare to other war movies you've seen?

[rabidralph]

No human could watch that scene with “The Butcher”

Doesn't that just blow your mind? Liberals seem to have a complete indifference to evil unless it serves their purpose. Thanks for your service, and yes, not once did I think that I was watching an actor perform. Cooper's performance was beyond "acting."

[Ditter]

I just called my brother and he was walking into the theater to see American Sniper. He said he'd let me know what he thinks about it.

[rabidralph]

That would be great. Let us know. Does anyone have any reports on the crowd sizes when they went to see it over the past few days? I saw it Jan. 17 and there was a line out the door when I arrived, a half-hour early and a line out the door as I was leaving. I don’t know that I could go back and see it again in the theater but I’ll buy it when it comes out on DVD. It was the same with with Lone Survivor.

[Ditter]

We went to an afternoon showing and the theater was half full at 4pm. That was a week ago.