Entertaining war movie

Rating: 7/10 (28 May 2015)

Entertaining war movie.
The story of Chris Kyle, the greatest sniper (in terms of confirmed kills) in US military history. 160 kills in four tours of Iraq.
While the war and action scenes are great, the human side seems rather superficial. Director Clint Eastwood tries to make a theme out his struggle between duty and having to kill people (and what war is doing to him and how he relates to his family and other non- combatants) but this is not explored very well. The movie is uneven in that we have intense war scenes followed by back-home scenes which should be emotional but lack depth.
Eastwood used to be a master at human drama and deft manipulation of viewers' emotions (see Million Dollar Baby, as a very good example), but here he seems to have lost his touch. Instead he opts for a more bombastic, action-filled approach.
The other issue with the movie would be the accuracy of it. By many accounts some of the details are not accurate. The faults lie mainly with some of the lesser details, which have been dramatized for cinema.
This all said, while not a brilliant, or multi-layered, movie, American Sniper is a fairly good war movie. It does also raise the thought of what war does to those who fight in it, even (or maybe particularly...) when they are incredibly good at their part in it.