Interesting story with good acting

Rating: 7/10 (15 September 2015)

I liked American Sniper because of the story and strong acting. Chris Kyle (played by Bradley Cooper) was raised in Texas and taught to stand up for himself by his Dad, who also taught him to shoot. He was living an underachieving life it seemed when events caused him to enlist as a Navy Seal at the age of 30. When he makes it, he gets drafted into the Sniper team, and begins four tours of duty in Iraq I guess it is. The story reports he became the highest performing sniper ever with 160 kills. Chris Kyle is real, and this movie was based on his book.
Clint Eastwood directed this story. He certainly added some Hollywood material, like this cat and mouse game between Kyle and an Iraqi sniper Mustafa that plays out continually. Since we have no idea what Mustafa was really like, this whole section was created.
Sienna Miller plays Kyle's wife and does a surprisingly good job of holding her own, delivering some gut-wrenching pleas for her man to return home.
The best part of this film is the acting from Bradley Cooper. Kyle did four tours of duty, over 1000 days of combat, and he never seemed to fully shake what this required him to do - be always vigilant and alert. He obviously suffered medically from stress and other PTSD symptoms. this part of his life was brilliantly scripted by Eastwood and performed by Cooper.
The story itself however holds no major surprises since it's based on a book, and a lot of newspaper material that you certainly heard and read. So the ending is not a shocker, but still sad, and Eastwood, as often directors do, weaves in real-life footage to bring home the point.
Whether all that is shown is true, that's up to you to judge. But I encourage you to watch American Sniper because the story is well written, but mostly the acting was excellent. Enjoy.