What a terribly frustrating film. Here we have an elite American soldier who has headed out to Iraq, peered down a scope for days on end, and chosen 200 times that the unfortunate at the other end needed to die. A difficult subject deserving a nuanced treatment.
The problem is that apart from some sighing and bowing of his head from time to time, Kyle seems unaffected by what he does, as is presumably essential to do this kind of work and not go insane. We have no idea about his character. So with the protagonist essentially a killing robot, it's left to the screenwriter and director to try to inject some depth, and there's plenty not go at.
Why is he here? How is Iraq at fault for the embassy bombings and 9/11 which prompted him to march into the recruitment office? What's prompted a woman to push a grenade into her son's hands and send him off to run at a 50 tonne tank? Why have some of the residents of these towns decided to stay and have their front doors kicked in by Marines or have their kids' limbs drilled to dust by the local militant sadist?
But these are difficult questions, and there's no apparent appetite to touch on them.
As pointed out by another reviewer, this is doubly depressing when you consider that this director produced one of the most harrowing shooting scene in any film, in "Unforgiven", where we hear a man die slowly over minutes while his killer agonises at his dying sobbing.
Finally, I didn't need to see Kyle get shot at the end, so have no qualms with the choice to show this as a sober piece of text. The fact that we've just seen dozens of people being wiped out through Kyle's scope does however leave me wondering if some of his victims' deaths might also deserve a more downbeat depiction.
So we're left with the tired old Stars and Stripes formula that's worked since time began. Western forces mowing down hordes of middle easterners. No doubt, this film needed to appeal to a certain home audience. As far as that's concerned, job done. I'm off for a shower to rinse off the jingoism.
The problem is that apart from some sighing and bowing of his head from time to time, Kyle seems unaffected by what he does, as is presumably essential to do this kind of work and not go insane. We have no idea about his character. So with the protagonist essentially a killing robot, it's left to the screenwriter and director to try to inject some depth, and there's plenty not go at.
Why is he here? How is Iraq at fault for the embassy bombings and 9/11 which prompted him to march into the recruitment office? What's prompted a woman to push a grenade into her son's hands and send him off to run at a 50 tonne tank? Why have some of the residents of these towns decided to stay and have their front doors kicked in by Marines or have their kids' limbs drilled to dust by the local militant sadist?
But these are difficult questions, and there's no apparent appetite to touch on them.
As pointed out by another reviewer, this is doubly depressing when you consider that this director produced one of the most harrowing shooting scene in any film, in "Unforgiven", where we hear a man die slowly over minutes while his killer agonises at his dying sobbing.
Finally, I didn't need to see Kyle get shot at the end, so have no qualms with the choice to show this as a sober piece of text. The fact that we've just seen dozens of people being wiped out through Kyle's scope does however leave me wondering if some of his victims' deaths might also deserve a more downbeat depiction.
So we're left with the tired old Stars and Stripes formula that's worked since time began. Western forces mowing down hordes of middle easterners. No doubt, this film needed to appeal to a certain home audience. As far as that's concerned, job done. I'm off for a shower to rinse off the jingoism.