Bradley Cooper plays an Iraq war veteran and wounded warrior in the Oscar-nominated biographical film American Sniper, which marks one of his grittiest roles.
The R-rated movie, directed by Clint Eastwood, hit select theaters on Christmas Day and gets a wider release in the United States on Friday, Jan. 16. It is based on Navy SEAL and Texas man Chris Kyle's 2012 memoir American Sniper: The Autobiography of the Most Lethal Sniper in U.S. Military History.
Pennsylvania-born Cooper, 40, puts on a southern accent and gained about 40 pounds to plays the main character, one of the U.S. military's best snipers, deemed "The Legend," who fights during multiple deployments in Iraq. He has difficulty adjusting to life back home in the United States, following physical injuries and war traumas. Sienna Miller plays his wife, Taya.
The movie also stars Glee alum and Frozen star Jonathan Groff, Battle: Los Angeles actor Cory Hardrict, Veronica Mars alum Kyle Gallner, Parenthood cast member Sam Jaeger and Nashville star Eric Close.
On Thursday, American Sniper received six Oscar nominations ahead of the 2014 ceremony on Feb. 22, including one for Best Picture, and individual nods for Eastwood, who already has four Oscars, and Cooper, who was previously nominated for his roles in the 2012 movie Silver Linings Playbook and the 2013 film American Hustle.
Check out what several critics said about American Sniper.
1. Time magazine's Richard Corliss praised Cooper's performance, saying that the actor, "who in earlier roles perfected the persona of the sharp conniver, makes a fast, expert U turn from American Hustle to American Sniper."
"Packing an extra 30 or so pounds of beef and beer weight, Cooper gives Chris a galoot's sincerity," he said. "He lacks the belligerence of the traditional war lover, allowing himself no Lone Star whoops when he hits a human target. Even in his courtship of Taya, at a bar frequented by raucous SEALs, he is ever the country gentleman."
Corliss also praised Eastwood's directing work, saying the 84-year-old has made "his finest directorial effort" since the 2008 film Gran Torino, "while painting on a much broader canvas."
"Utterly in command of his epic material, he films the Iraqi action in terse, tense panoramas with little cinematic editorializing, as if he were an old Greek or Hebrew God who is never surprised at man's ability to kill his fellow men, or to find reasons to do so," he wrote. "Directing 34 films over 44 years, Eastwood has honed his craft to its essentials: make it seem as if the story is telling itself."
2. Screencrush's Matt Singer called American Sniper a "disappointing war film."
"Though Eastwood's depiction of 'the enemy' in Flags of our Fathers and Letters From Iwo Jima was nuanced and thoughtful, his portrayal of the Iraq War in American Sniper is jingoistic to the point of cartoonishness," he wrote. "Kyle even has an 'arch-nemesis' of sorts in the form of a sniper who works for Iraqi insurgents, and jumps around from rooftop to rooftop like some kind of parkour super-villain."
"A few sequences—like the brutal and suspenseful opening—reflect the true horror of war," he added. "But others lapse so far into ridiculousness that it becomes difficult to take the movie seriously."
3. USA Today's Claudia Puig gave American Sniper three out of four stars and compared its wartime sequences to those seen in the 2008 Oscar-nominated film The Hurt Locker, calling them "well-paced and harrowing."
"Among the film's best scenes are those of Kyle with his finger resting on the trigger as he focuses unwaveringly on his target," she said. "The audience feels his tension, as well as the crushing weight of split-second decisions. A mother and boy may be wearing suicide vests: Does he fire at them without being 100 percent certain? If he waits for more information, does he risk his men being wounded or killed? It's hard to imagine a tougher dilemma."
4. HitFix's Drew McWeeny said Eastwood "misses the mark" with "stilted" American Sniper, although Cooper "shines" with his performance.
"The biggest problem it has is that Clint Eastwood has already dealt with this exact material thematically, and he's done it much better," he said. "Unforgiven, after all, looks at the toll violence takes on the human soul and the way someone becoming a legend can make them a target and it does so with an elegance and a sense of both humor and humanity that is not present in American Sniper."
"American Sniper is a solidly-staged but unexceptional picture, filled with overly familiar dramatic situations and a surprisingly blindered view of the world around its central character," he wrote. "While Bradley Cooper does a strong job of inhabiting the role of Chris Kyle, the real-life Navy SEAL whose story is told by the film, Jason Hall's script fails to crack why this story is being told to us."
5. Schmoes Know's Kristian Harloff gave American Sniper 3.2 out of five "Schmoes," while co-host Mark Ellis gave it 4.2 out of five "Schmoes."
"Bradley Cooper's great, there's no doubt about it," Harloff said. "The movie itself, it felt like a CNN special—an interesting CNN special, but as far as an overall movie...I dunno, I didn't know if I cared as much. I know I cared a lot about the soldier for what he went through but I think that had a lot to do with Bradley Cooper, the developments of everything...it lost me along the way."
Ellis said he found American Sniper "fascinating" and thought Eastwood did a "fantastic job" with both the "intense" combat scenes and the scenes showing Kyle back home with his wife after a deployment.
American Sniper hit select theaters on Christmas Day and gets a wider release in the United States on Friday, Jan. 16. Watch a trailer and additional promo video.