A Movie About War, But Not Glorifying It

By Michael Cavanaugh

There were very few scenes in American Sniper that can be said to have lingered. In fact, in relation to most movies of a similar genre, the glimpses that director Clint Eastwood gives his viewers into the life of the late Chief Petty Officer Chris Kyle, decorated Navy SEAL, may seem to whizz by at an inordinate pace. The scenes that do linger, however, the tense, gripping ones that seem to progress in slow-motion, are the very foundation of American Sniper.

It is not a war movie. It is, more accurately, a movie about war. It not only does a great justice to a good man and hero in Chris Kyle, but to all of the heroic men and women who have served, are serving and will serve in our armed forces.
For this very reason, I have been troubled by recent remarks by celebrities such as Michael Moore and Seth Rogen. In a tweet from his personal account, Moore said, “My uncle killed by sniper in WW2. We were taught snipers were cowards. Will shoot u in the back. Snipers aren’t heroes. And invaders r worse.”

Soon after, he followed up with a second tweet which read, “But if you’re on the roof of your home defending it from invaders who’ve come 7K miles, you are not a sniper, u are brave, u are a neighbor.”

Now, I will not get into refuting the not-so-subtle political jabs made in those tweets, but I will say that, as someone with friends and family both currently serving and having recently retired from the military, I found this particularly distasteful and offensive. Moore is not just criticizing the movie; he is directly insulting the very men and women who defend our freedom and security, and the freedom and security of those who are not strong enough to defend it on their own.

Enter Rogen’s comments, which were directed toward the movie itself rather than the real -life counterparts the actors represent.

“American Sniper kind of reminds me of the movie that’s showing in the third act of Inglourious Basterds,” read Rogen’s tweet. The aforementioned scene in Quentin Tarantino’s 2009 film depicts a Nazi sniper, perched high above in a tower, killing hordes of incoming American soldiers, muttering nationalistic lines that do not try to mask their satirical intent.

While I do find Rogen’s comment ill-conceived, it is not so much the comment itself that irked me, but rather the dialogue that sprung from it. Over the next few days, enough people jumped to Rogen’s defense, bashing American Sniper film as being nothing more than propaganda to glorify war and killing (in particular, the killing of Muslims), that I found myself questioning whether these so-called critics had watched the same movie that I had seen.

One prevailing criticism of the film as propaganda is that it is racially insensitive and hateful of the Iraqi people. Throughout the film, one hears the word “savage” used by the American soldiers. Some of the film’s critics claim that this term is directed at the Iraqi people, and that it is not only inaccurately representing the American soldiers, but intentionally spreading hate of the Iraqi people (and, by extension, Muslims in general).

This is, of course, ignorant.

While I am sure that there are some Americans, as well as some soldiers, who broadly and ignorantly judge the Iraqi people (or the ethnic group that is referred to as “Middle Eastern”) as “savages,” this is not the norm for America or for the armed forces. In fact, many members of our armed forces find themselves building close relationships with the people living in the areas they occupy — in particular, members of the local militia forces whom they supplement. Just look at the story of Marcus Luttrell, the “Lone Survivor.” He would not be alive to tell his story, had a number of Pashun villagers in Afghanistan not risked their lives to help him.

When the soldiers in American Sniper use the term “savage,” it is not directed at the Iraqi people, but at the insurgents with whom they are in combat on a daily basis — the ones who threaten not only the lives of their brothers-in-arms, but of innocent civilians as well. The savages who are willing to take the lives of women and children as collateral damage in attacks on American soldiers, to slaughter their own people; these are the people at whom the American soldiers direct this term.

American Sniper is, at its core, a movie about war and perhaps the most accurate to date. The main focus of the movie is not killing. For insightful viewers, it is not even so much about Chris Kyle. He is the tragic vehicle through which we can address the main issue presented by the film: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) onset by the horrible things experienced by soldiers while on deployments.

The so-called propaganda scenes that depict American soldiers killing enemy combatants are the building blocks for this psychological disorder. And the scenes which depict American soldiers being killed in combat? These are the mortar which binds them together.

But PTSD is not a disorder that affects only the individual. Under Eastwood’s direction, American Sniper pulls no punches in portraying the strain it can have on those closest to the afflicted. The sincerity with which Bradley Cooper and Sienna Miller capture the essence of the military family was almost uncomfortable.

I guess uncomfortable is one of the best words I can think of to describe American Sniper, and why I feel that these claims that it is pro-war propaganda are absurd. It is at its core an uncomfortable movie. You will see a mother and her young child shot, both by Chris Kyle, and the overwhelming emotions experienced by him thereafter. You will see numerous American soldiers shot and killed. You will listen to the mother of Navy Seal Marc Lee, the first Seal to be killed in action in Iraq, read her son’s hand-written words of disillusionment with the Iraq War as she weeps over his casket.

Then, before the emotional credits roll, you will sit in an uncomfortably silent theater as a single sentence reminds you that the loving husband, decorated soldier and hero into whose life you just had a glimpse has been dead for nearly two years, killed by a young veteran whose PTSD Kyle was attempting to help heal.

American Sniper is uncomfortable; that is what makes it real, what makes it one of the few movies that “gets it right,” as many veterans have said following its release. There is nothing glorious about war, but there is something truly inspiring about those who put their lives on the line for a cause in which they believe, and for the men and women beside them.

Michael Cavanaugh, FCRH ’15, is an English major from Mount Vernon, NY.