Movie Review: American Sniper

Truth: I don't love war movies.  I'm more of a romantic comedy kind of girl - but every now and then, I can be persuaded.  As was the situation with American Sniper.  My husband had heard it rave reviews from colleagues and suggested we go see it.  My mom was already babysitting and feeling the weight of our long days, we opted for a casual dinner at a local Mexican restaurant followed by a movie night.

I couldn't stop thinking about this movie for 24 hours after we saw it.  First, Bradley Cooper and Sienna Miller are phenomenal, as is the supportive cast, and I'm not historically a Bradley Cooper fan.  American Sniper flows well, the story is told across sniper Chris Kyle's four tours in Iraq, from meeting his wife to the aftermath of surviving post-war with PTSD. It is emotional, intense, poetic, and terribly tragic all at the same time.  Of course the film did include plenty of gunfire, grit, and raw imagery that typically dissuades me from such films, but nothing was gratuitous, everything was intentional and profound.  I found myself googling about the real Chris and Taya Kyle afterwards, reading about their story, and even placed Chris Kyle's autobiography (which the movie was based upon) on my queue at the library.  And this for a movie I didn't even really want to see in the first place.

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