Once again, this April 23, 2015, "American Snipe" is back in the news, this time being repressed from University of Maryland students.
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Every Great War Film is a Great Anti War Film
When Chris Kyle was a young boy growing up in central Texas, he learned to hunt, to fight to win, he loved Jesus, bronco busting and enjoyed pretty girls. How was it that he grew up to become the ultra patriot, an American hero, and now with
the critically acclaimed film about his life as a soldier
breaking box office records, someone immortalized, lionized?
Simply, Chris Kyle was reared by a God fearing church deacon, Wayne Kyle, played by Ben Read, who taught him to hunt, know Jesus, and to understand the ways of this world, personified in these comments he made to Chris as a pre-adolescent:
“There are three types of people in this world: sheep, wolves, and sheepdogs,” Wayne Kyle implores his receptive son to know.
“Some people prefer to believe that evil doesn’t exist in the world, and if it ever darkened their doorstep, they wouldn’t know how to protect themselves. Those are the sheep.”
“Then you’ve got predators, who use violence to prey on the weak. They’re the wolves. And then there are those blessed with the gift of aggression, an overpowering need to protect the flock. These men are the rare breed who live to confront the wolf. They are the sheepdog.”
Wayne Kyle, as the good Christian father, extolled his son, Chris, to be the sheepdog. This prophetic pronouncement was employed throughout the Jason Hall screenplay of the Chris Kyle autobiography, then finely crafted into this
Clint Eastwood film, as the seminal thread that drove Chief Petty Officer Kyle to be 'America's most lethal sniper'.
Chris Kyle, Bradley Cooper, behind the sniper rifle preparing for his kill, with Marine Corp spotter /guard (behind): Above. Click on image to expand.
Yes, this Navy SEAL did kill women and children. Let's go ahead put that 'red meat' on the table. The film does not skirt around this truth; Director Eastwood reveals this reality in the first scene, which was true in real life for the legendary sniper - the initial kills for Chief Kyle, his first two of a confirmed 160 kills (actual number closer to 255 kills) were a pre-adolescent boy and a woman (probably the child's mother).
If your initial reaction is what kind of American hero would kill women and children, and then call the Iraq insurgents savages? You might should rather consider: What semblance of a society, governed by a strict religious sect, would push women and children - many of them - to confront American armored convoys with RPG grenades and other suicide based explosives to do the killing of American soldiers for their rather unproductive men. To continue a clarion point, for a clear thinking individual, especially an American citizen: Why would you care what Navy SEAL Chris Kyle was tasked to do, to save Marine lives, providing he remained within the United States Military's stringent rules of engagement?
Chris Kyle, Bradley Cooper, has a few reflective moments as he deals with his 'job' of taking the lives, with great prejudice, of enemy combatants - men, women and children: Above. Click on image to expand.
Regardless of one's innate view of the proprietary of principled conduct during the 'fog of war', one must respect the artistry of the re-creation of narrative to celluloid; to tell the story convincingly and true, irrespective of how difficult of a tale it is to digest here in the civilized world of the United States of America. Elsewhere, in the corners of a more barbaric world, where 'honor killings', female genital mutilation, the stoning of women raped, homosexual genocide, and women denied any education, just to name a few of the societal atrocities within the Muslim world of the Middle East, most Americans are
ill equipped with the wisdom or the intelligence to judge what soldiers, like Chris Kyle, did, and do, to protect their brothers in arms.
Chris Kyle, Bradley Cooper (rear, right), with his brother Navy SEALs hearing direct orders to go after 'The Butcher of Baghdad', with U.S. Marines: Above. Click on image to expand.
Accordingly, these dual threads of this tale of heroism and abject sacrifice: 1) The warrior spirit of the super soldier, who serves with great honor for 'God and Country', but, moreover, exhibits the incomparable vigilance to protect fellow SEALs, and act as a veritable overlord, with sniper rifle at the ready, to safeguard the lives of Marines in his charge; 2) the difficult decompression of the super soldier, who, irrespective of his ambition to deny his condition, suffered from profound PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder). Director Eastwood's treatment of these two issues, in his trademark succinct style, spare in composition, extraordinary as a communicative device, Mr. Eastwood's film is a work of art reminiscent of his best work in
"Gran Torino", "Million Dollar Baby" and
"Unforgiven".
Director Eastwood, as is his directorial style, condensed the essence of Chris Kyle's disordered predicament to a short meeting with a VA Psychologist:
Navy Doctor:
"Would you be surprised if I told you that the Navy has credited you with... over 160 kills?"
Navy Doctor:
"Do you ever think that... you might have seen things or... done some things over there that you wish you hadn't?"
Chris Kyle:
"Oh, that's not me. No."
Navy Doctor:
"What's not you?"
Chris Kyle:
"I was just protecting my guys, they were trying to kill... our soldiers and I... I'm willing to meet my Creator and answer for every shot that I took."
Chris Kyle:
"The thing that... haunts me are all the guys that I couldn't save."
Chris Kyle:
"Now I'm willing and able to... be there but I'm not, I'm here I quit."
Because of the film's indisputable sense for exhibiting the essential reality of war, "American Sniper" is nominated for Best Picture, among another 5 nominations, in this year's Oscar Awards. Bradley Cooper is nominated for Best Actor. His role as the heroic, conflicted Chris Kyle was as integral to this emotional tale of the ultimate human experience, as the expressive Jason Hall screenplay, and Clint Eastwood's tight, extra-efficient direction. Without Actor Cooper's visceral performance successfully transferred to a primed and receptive audience, the film would have simply been sufficient as entertainment, but not noteworthy to indelibly memorialize this hero, this good man - Chris Kyle.
Chris Kyle, Bradley Cooper (left), returns home to his wife Taya Kyle, Sienna Miller: Above. Click on image to expand.
Chris Kyle's wife, played by Sienna Miller, lobbied her husband to put their family first; however, for years, as Chief Kyle served 4 full tours in theaters of conflict, he put his fellow soldiers first; above Family, above Country, but not above God, for taking care of God's good children, as the proverbial 'sheep dog' would, is the highest and best duty any man could endeavor.
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