Kristin Reviews American Sniper

First, I want to say that I adore Clint Eastwood; he’s incredibly talented and creative, and when he’s working with a story that works, he’s one of the finest directors working in Hollywood today. I also want to clarify that my feelings about American Sniper are not colored by any political opinions or personal feelings I have about the war in Iraq.

American Sniper, as written in screenplay form, is not a story that works. I have not read Chris Kyle’s memoir, upon which the screenplay is based, but I imagine it’s a pretty straightforward account of events in Kyle’s life, including his experiences during his four tours of duty overseas. And, to be fair, that’s exactly what we get in the movie version. Unfortunately, movies – and in particular movie drama and conflict – have their own rules, which is why filmed adaptations of books often fail.

I used to tell my screenwriting students that movie characters do not just appear out of the ether when FADE IN arrives or disappear as if they’d never existed upon FADE OUT. They are in the process of living their lives when the movie starts, they’re still doing things, even when they’re not in the scene that happens to be on the screen at a given moment, and, assuming they don’t die before the curtain closes, they continue to make decisions and respond to events after the audience has gone home. The screenwriter’s job is to select the most interesting parts – the most dramatic parts – the parts a person might want to pay money and sit in a dark room to watch – and put them on the screen.

Chris Kyle’s memoir focuses on all the stuff Chris Kyle felt was interesting. Because they happened to him, it’s fair to assume that a lot of the things that happened while he was serving his country were interesting . . . to him. But for me, those things all fall into the category of “war.”

In American Sniper pretty much war happens for two hours. There’s no suspense or objective being pursued, although it seems that the screenwriters attempted to create somewhat of a cat and mouse game between Kyle and an enemy sniper as a thread to hold the whole thing together. Unfortunately, since neither Kyle nor the enemy sniper are actively pursuing each other so much as taking advantage of opportunities to try to kill each other when they happen to be nearby, it’s not enough of an objective to maintain suspense or momentum through the second act. It’s just war. And then some more war. And then a bunch more war.

And THEN [SPOILER ALERT -- because the movie is based upon true events, I’m going to throw out a spoiler here under the assumption that most readers are probably already aware of it – if you’re not already familiar with Chris Kyle’s story, you might want to skip the rest of this paragraph], something incredibly interesting happens off screen . . . and the movie ends. Apparently [again, stop reading if you don’t know and don’t want to know], Chris Kyle and his neighbor, Chad Littlefield, were murdered at a shooting range by a veteran marine Kyle was trying to help recover from PTSD. This – to me – is interesting. Unfortunately, it occurs at the end of the movie. So, basically, the movie is: Chris Kyle grows up, war, war, more war, some more war, something interesting happens, the end.

Bradley Cooper plays Chris Kyle with a stoic simplicity that fits the character. He’s great. Clint Eastwood directs the script he’s working with skillfully. The script he’s working with, though, doesn’t tell an engaging story. It’s exhausting to watch, and not in a good way.

-Kristin
1.8.2015