a truly revolutionary war film, one of the greatest of the last 25 years

Rating: 10/10 (5 November 2005)

despite the views of many people who saw this movie it has absolutely nothing to do w/ the military, government, or soldiers, this movie is an insight into the mind of one man Anthony Swofford. As a kid who skips college and joins the Marines, "Swoff" eventually works his way into an elite unit possibly the worlds most elite assassins, marine snipers. The movie shows you the mind of a man who trains for years to be a stone cold killer, to be able to look his target right in the face as if standing 2 feet in front of him and pull the trigger that ends their life. This movie isn't about killing people (so if your looking for a war movie with great battle scenes don't bother), it is about what happens to a man like swoff and the others of his unit, whoso sole purpose in war is to kill people, when spending years of their lives training to kill and never being put to use, then when their one chance comes to use their abilities it is taken away at the last moment. there are many who are saying that this movie is a politic/soldier/military bashing film yet at no point does the main character state anything against bush nor does he not support the war he was apart of, in fact he was thrilled to be there and only longed to do his duties. the fact is that this movie is about the mind of a marine sniper, specifically swoff. it is a great war film, possibly one of the better of all time and is acted to perfection by jake gyllenhall, peter saarssgard, jamie foxx, and others. it definitely deserves praise from all the members of our military and i expect to see it quite a few times when the Oscar nominations roll out not to long from now.