He is the legend.

That is the title that Chris Kyle holds. He is the deadliest most lethal sniper in U.S. Military history.  “American Sniper,” the 2 hour and 12 minute, R-rated film directed by Clint Eastwood, is a true story based on the life of Chris Kyle.

The movie starts off with Kyle (Bradley Cooper) laying on top of boxes on a roof in Iraq getting ready to shoot a young boy who has been handed a grenade to kill American soldiers. Right as Kyle is about to shoot the gun, there is a flashback to when he was a kid with his dad hunting. After shooting a deer his dad tells him “You’ve got a gift. You’re going to make a fine hunter someday,” which sticks with Kyle forever. Kyle enlists to become a Navy Seal, he endures the torture of the training, the commentary from the sergeants about his older age, and overall the hardships of becoming a Navy Seal.

Leaving behind his wife Taya (played by Sienna Miller), Kyle goes on four tours and becomes almost addicted to being at war. Throughout the span of the tours we see how hard it is for Kyles family while he is away. Taya has two kids and when Kyle does come home his head is still in the war and not with his family, we see how sad and angry his wife is when Kyle can’t satisfy her and her needs and isn’t fulfilling his role as a father. It was really heartbreaking to see Kyle’s relationship with his wife and kids start to deteriorate because even when he was home he wasn’t actually home. He was already away from home enough and when he was home and his mind was still at war we see the heartbreak in Taya’s eyes.

Taya threatens to leave Kyle but it does not phase him, he is too eager to go back to war. During the fourth tour, Kyle fulfills his duty and goal of killing the opposing Syrian Sniper and tells Taya he is ready to come home for good. This scene was a relief for everyone in the theater because if Kyle would not of been ready to come home, when he did Taya and the kids would’ve be gone. When Kyle does come home after the fourth tour we see him in a scene where he is at a bar, he hadn’t told his family he was home yet. We see how depressed Kyle is and how hard it is for him to cope and adjust to not being at war. We see how difficult it is for him to come back to the realization that he is home and he has kids and a wife he needs to take care of now.

The movie was very intense in some scenes because we see kids and people getting shot and we see the impact it has on Kyle’s life. At the end of the movie it was amazing to see all the respect everyone in the theater had, instead of clapping like you usually do when a movie is over everyone walked out in silence. It was really incredible.

Bradley Cooper did an outstanding job of filling the role of Kyle; he gained 40 pounds of muscle and created a very believable Texan accent to really get viewers to know Kyle. He really took on the role and was serious about making sure that he was really like Kyle. In my opinion, the director picked the right actors and actresses to fill the roles because Cooper and Miller looked very similar to Chris and Taya.

I think that the movie did an amazing job at capturing the difficulties of war and the life of a soldier. Kyle had become attached to war and felt that he could have saved more lives than he did, he never felt like what he did was enough. He was never truly satisfied and felt like the deaths of soldiers was his fault. Director Clint Eastwood captured every detail that viewers needed to know to understand the life of Chris Kyle. I think overall “American Sniper” was an excellent movie and I have a lot of respect for soldiers and war in general. Kyle had 160 confirmed kills over the four tours, and we see how hard it was for him to make those kills.

I recommend American Sniper for anyone who wants to see a good war movie and gain a better understanding of the hardships of being a soldier on and off the battlefield.