Clint Eastwood's American Sniper

Clint Eastwood’s American Sniper was first released in Australia on January 22, 2015. It is the film version of Chris Kyle’s personal memoir of the same name, written by Jason Hall. The film is set between Texas and Iraq and follows Chris Kyle on his ten year journey as a sniper for the seals. Played by Bradley Cooper, Chris finds the love of his life Taya played by Sienna Miller, but feels his need to serve his country is stronger than his need to be with his family. Throughout his journey he struggles through four tours of duty in the middle-east, while at home his family life continues, his wife gives birth to two children and audience watch them grow while their father is absent. The key theme in this film would have to be war and how it …show more content…
The audience watches Chris on a mental journey as well as a physical one. He starts the film unhappy with his life, feeling like he wasn’t fulfilling his life by being a cowboy. It doesn’t take him long to realise that serving his country would give hum that fulfilment and create a purpose to his life. But throughout the film another purpose to Chris’s life is formed. He has created a family with his wife yet is too emotionally distraught by war to understand. The audience is shown this when Chris returns home between his tours his happy personality no longer shines through and he begins to hide away in himself, constantly thinking about war. Chris was constantly aware of his surroundings Eastwood made this clear by using sounds of key events that happened while he was in the middle-east in everyday situations to show audiences how soldiers are when they return from war, an example of this is when Chris hears the sound of a tyre drill in a mechanic but as well as hearing the drill sound he also hears the cries of the little boy and his family when ‘the Butcher’ was punishing them for talking to the Americans. Because of this the film maker didn’t have to specifically use flashbacks as the sounds were enough for the audience to remember the event. Chris’s life events at home also affect him on the battlefield. In one scene we see a child pick up a grenade and ready to shoot it …show more content…
However in war this aging can often be sped up. War physically affects people, through Chris journey he watches many people die, but those victims of war can be seen as the lucky ones. Towards the end of the film Chris returns back to America for good and begins to work in the veterans association. Here he sees soldiers just like him that have come back from war with serious injuries such as missing legs or disfigured hands. He realises that he is lucky to have returned totally fine physically and feels the need to give back. However while in battle the physical pain of war is more evident. Many people die throughout the course of this film. And of these deaths a good majority are those killed by the American sniper. The film makers’ clever camera angles such as making it feel like we were looking through the spy glass on top of the rifle or having the camera in first person allowed us to physically see what Chris would have