I'm Lois Lane and she's carrying so it's
not uncommon for a film to reveal its
main theme in the opening scene of its
story and as to grab the audience's
attention and give them a taste of
what's to come not unlike the very essay
that I'm reading to you right now or
really any other medium that tries to
effectively convey a message American
sniper as you can see here is no
exception to this if you SEAL Chris Kyle
is laying on a rooftop and war-torn
Fallujah his rifle aimed at a mother and
her son a way for Clint Eastwood to
point us to his film's main theme family
or rather the tragic destruction of
family through war however it seems that
this message didn't really catch on to a
number of high profile audiences most
notable are tweets from the likes of
Seth Rogen who compared the film to the
faux Nazi propaganda movie shown in the
third act of inglorious basterds then
there is Michael Moore staying at all
snipers or cowards no on Chomsky
weighing in on what he states is a
testament of support of everything
that's wrong with American foreign
policy documentary director Robert
Greenwald
doing roughly the same thing on MSNBC
and finally former presidential
candidates Howard themed speaking his
mind on Real Time with Bill Maher I bet
you if you looked at a cross-section of
the Tea Party and people go to see this
movie there's a lot of intersection I
could go on for a while but I think you
get the point a lot of high-profile
partisan liberal viewers did not enjoy
what they interpret it to be a blamele
Pro or propaganda movie a movie made by
a man whose personal politics already
seems to run counter to those who stand
against the film when somebody does not
do the job we gotta let them go
a man who would have therefore naturally
and consciously made a movie that shows
audiences a simplistic and glorified
version of the war which is odd to say
the least that would be completely out
of character for Clint Eastwood and
director who has a record of making
nuanced and often open minded films be
glamorizing the gratuitous killing in
western movies addressing gender and
class issues for women in sports
humanizing Japanese soldiers during the
Second World War tackling the corrupt
criminal justice system of the early
20th century and being criticized by
some conservatives for grammar sizing
the homosexual private
FBI director Edgar Hoover not your
accuracy point out the true message of
American sniper we can make use of
literary theorists Kenneth Burke's
cluster analysis method which attempts
to seek out the film's most important
recurring terms the positive God term on
the one hand and the counteracting devil
term on the other in between floats up
ordinate terms that align with either of
the main terms but that can change their
value as story progresses but before we
get into any of that let's start by
taking a closer look at our god term in
order to truly understand the character
of Kris Cal and why he does what he does
we first need to examine how his value
system works traveling back to you if we
can observe how his strict upbringing in
a highly conservative household laid the
foundations for the man he would later
become from his father stoic sheepdog
philosophy of protecting the defenseless
from all that evil in the world to
sermons about God's plan for his
believers yet unknown path to glory and
lastly a lesson in perseverance get back
here you don't ever leave your rifle in
the dirt all these teachings work for
the constable family to protect it from
danger to believe in God's plan for its
glory and to never abandon one's duty
towards it this value system that Cal
carries with him into adulthood and that
after perhaps having laid dormant for
some time is reawakened by the terrorist
attacks on the American embassies
protected Cal's words and emotional
reaction indicating that his notion of
family has extended into the nation most
family an attack on the nation is
indirectly an attack on his own family
which pushes him into joining the Navy
SEALs who like many other military units
actively try to form a tight-knit group
of non quitters super-clean heart was
nearly washout to quit on most men sir
so Chris despite his apparent old age
stays faithful to his beliefs and
doesn't quit on the solder newly
perceived family another instance where
Krista's values influence events is when
he manages to grab interest of his
future wife daya after he denounces a
fellow seal for cheating and quitting on
his marriage Kristin tell you shared
love for family makes
subsequent relationship grow and things
seem to be shaping up soo Cal's divine
plan for a while until one fateful
September morning worst devil term that
slowly starts to take control over Cal's
family values the first value that
scrutiny test is a sheepdog notion of
protecting family which as we've seen
consists of three layers his family at
home his military family and his country
it's Chris's deploy to Iraq we seem
excelling in his role on the battlefield
as an overwatch sniper keeping the evils
of war from his military family as well
as keeping it as far away as possible
from his own direct family the way the
Col home was supposed to go babe
however he slowly finds out that it's
impossible to do either of these things
because regardless of his expertise as a
sniper he's proven to be unable to
protect every single marine under his
watch and he also has to live with the
fact that in order to protect his family
he's forced to destroy another and even
though he does manage to protect
countless of troops from physical harm
he can children from the mental harm the
war and never believe causes them as is
exemplified when Chris runs into his
little brother who is about to return
home from the war he's tired man
going home curls building frustration
over its inability to protect everyone
climax when he witnesses the deaths of
an Iraqi family he bowed to protect
after having extracted vital information
from them and thereby consciously having
involved them into the war his first
deployment ends those with the notion
that war and protecting through war
inevitably makes collateral damage of
family which we can see even more
clearly as Cal returns home with his
feelings of frustration and guilt gone
on resolve it quickly becomes clear that
far from having left the war behind
Chris is brought at home in the form of
mental trauma is developing PTSD causes
him to become increasingly disconnected
from his family life having become
absent-minded he constantly slips back
to the evils of the war the death of the
Iraqi family perhaps the perfect
metaphor for Chris's and ability to keep
war and family separate is when he's
watching American troops getting shot by
his rival sniper while sitting next to a
Christmas tree the epitome of everything
family in God and peace still unwilling
to talk about the war Chris is thus
unwittingly destroying his own family
and taya tries to tell him that talk
about it you're not protecting me by not
talking about but in Kyle's mind
protecting through war is the only way
of protecting both his direct family as
well as his other families about us for
Chris quitting the war would mean
quitting on the Navy SEALs and therefore
his family in Iraq which is not
something his value system allows him to
do and it's why we see him returning
again and again and again this no
quitting mentality is supported by his
confidence in finding glory in God's
divine plan as he carries with him this
old Bible wherever he goes and he
continuously as sure as taya dad you got
another the afraid Oh what do you
thought parting applying for Chris his
path to glory is in his self-perceived
crusade against the forces of evil in
Iraq which seems to be why he's boarding
a crusader cross tattoo and why he
believes in the righteousness of the
u.s. presence there there's a warrior
who sing God's plan and glory therefore
become associated with war rather than
family however Cal's never-ending
crusade becomes increasingly reckless
and vengeful over time as he sets out on
a personal mission to find and kill the
people responsible for killing his
fellow soldiers and
family this transformation can be seen
in seals adopting the Punisher logo a
Marvel antihero who will do anything to
get revenge against the people who
killed his family but it's also
noticeable in Kyle's behavior at home
where he's now completely disconnected
from his family
leading to tae ik giving him an
ultimatum if you leave again poopy poopy
here when you get back
not only does Kyle's plan an obsession
almost destroy what he holds most dear
it also comes to the cost of two of his
friends one of them his best friend Mark
Lee it would be preacher turned soldier
was slowly becoming disillusioned by the
war and caused the automatic
interpretation of God's plan for glory
this is shown through too strongly
worded anti-war letter he leaves behind
my question is when does glory fade away
become the wrongful crusade and just
beside me I was consumed what completely
ice it's a message of the glorification
that only really hits Cal when who's
finally got the chance to take out
Mustapha the Syrian sniper that started
his crusade against orders to stand down
Kris chooses to pull the trigger instead
to protect his fellow soldiers who show
his no quitter mentality and most of all
to finally find catharsis in his crusade
or his plan for glory
that's when stafa falls however there's
no great celebration no real catharsis
for Kris as his friend speaks the words
mission accomplished perhaps referring
to george w bush's intima speech after
the initial invasion of iraq had ended
of course the war was far from over at
that point there was no real nuanced
thought-out plan for post-war Iraq
giving but a false sense of catharsis
something similar happens after Karl
takes that shot their position now
exposed Cal's team is quickly surrounded
by insurgents as they face certain death
he realizes that his crusade will
ultimately be the end of him and his
family as he finally decides it's time
to go home already
I'm ready to go home by sheer luck the
team manages to escape the insurgents
through a sandstorm
a perfect metaphor for the fog of war
perhaps signifying Kris struggling with
his internal moral consciousness his
struggle between family and war and it's
here where he visually quits on both the
war and dogmatism of his father's
upbringing by leaving his rifle in the
dirt however even after having be
aligned with his family and taking up a
healthier Sheepdog role by helping
disabled and traumatized veterans deal
with their experiences Christian would
ultimately become a victim of the war so
I would argue that far from being a pro
war Pro neoconservative propaganda movie
American sniper can much more accurately
be described as an anti-war movie
depicting its destructive nature towards
family weatherbeater Kyle family the
Navy SEAL brotherhood or even the family
of rival sniper Mustapha war always
invades the home and corrupts and
destroys it from the been director Clint
Eastwood made a film condemning the war
or not the warrior and criticizing the
neoconservative politics that resorted
to it American sniper is not a direct
adaptation of Chris Kyle's life and it
isn't meant to be this which seems to
have roughly adapted his story to make a
broader statement to make a film that
respects and puts emphasis on its
veterans one that helps us understand
their experience and one that asks us
not to forget their struggle in the
words of Bradley Cooper for me and for
Clint this movie was always a character
study about what the plight is for a
soldier if it's not this movie I hope to
god another movie will come out where it
will shed light on the fact of what
servicemen and women have to go through
and that we need to pay attention to our
vets it doesn't go any further than that
it's not a political discussion about
war even it's a discussion about the
reality and the reality is that people
are coming home and we have to take care
of them
[Music]
all right thank you all so much for
watching seeing how much hate American
sniper received I just had to express my
views of the movie so I hope this video
cleared things up a little bit
I want to thank Daniel Cameron for his
species on partisan reception of
American sniper which was a big
influence for this video
delves extensively into how and why
political audiences came to such a
widely different interpretation of the
film lastly if you want to help us out
and sustain this channel hop on over to
patreon or PayPal where you can leave us
a dollar anyways thank you all again for
watching happy fourth of July to our
American viewers and I hope to see you
all on the next one
[Music]