Intense and powerful!!! Great way to end awards season!!!!

Rating: 10/10 (21 January 2015)

American Sniper: Powerful and intense. Two words that perfectly describe American Sniper. From the moment Chris Kyle is deployed to Iraq, the intensity in the film never lets up. Without a doubt, this is the most intense film I have ever seen. I thought good action movies kept me at the edge of my seat, but American Sniper is the true definition of an edge-of-a-seat film. At some points of the movie, I almost had to stand up and take a deep breath because my heart was beating so fast. I could tell everyone else in the audience felt the same way. With Clint Eastwood's best directing since Gran Torino, career best performance from Bradley Cooper, and the most powerful scriptwriting I have seen, American Sniper excels in nearly every category.
I just want you guys to know that some may find this movie biased because it calls a lot of the Iraqi's savages and seems very one-sided in it's view point of the War. This movie is about a soldier's life, and no way in hell a Navy SEAL is gonna think the work he does is not important or the men who try to kill his teammates are nothing less than scumbags. All of us would think this way if someone tried to kill our friends.
The trailer for this film kind of makes it seem like the movie is a little boring, but that is literally the opposite of what this film is. All of the emotion and intensity they are able to convey behind a sniper scope and with no one talking is astounding and very impressive. It draws you into the story with those emotions and intense scenes and you feel like you are living in the story with him. The script was near-perfect as well for the story it was telling as well. I will never know how hard it is for military men to acclimate back to their lives back home, but now I at least have a better understanding of the fight they have to go through from hearing gun shots all day to expecting to be normal at their son's birthday party. It is exactly like what Taya Kyle, played by Sienna Miller, says to Chris Kyle, "if you think this war hasn't changed you, your wrong." The power it was able to convey in nearly every scene was incredible, the script, the music, the acting, just everything went together perfectly. The audience felt exactly what Clint Eastwood, the director, wanted us to feel. I think it might even be his best work since Unforgiven to be honest.
When I saw Bradley Cooper in the trailer for this film, I could not believe it was him. He looks so different which is just a testament to how much dedication he puts into his roles. He worked for months on end to put forty-plus pounds of muscle on to play the most deadly sniper in military history. His acting was phenomenal. He has a perfect Texas accent and plays the born and bread country boy down to a tee. He definitely deserves every inch of that Oscar nomination he received. How perfectly he played not only a Navy SEAL, but a SEAL who has to find some impossible way to go back to the life he has home is amazing.
This film again is extremely intense and some scenes in Iraq do get a little graphic so make sure you are ready to see this film because it is not one of those films you can just pick up and watch whenever. If you can handle it though, I highly recommend American Sniper as your first choice walking into the theater.
For more of my reviews, go to my website at reviewsbywest.com