I like to read the book before I see
the film. American Psycho Sniper is a difficult one to write
a fair review of, particularly as a non-American. As I was reading it
I found myself almost laughing at what an unreconstructed plonker the
guy was. What I didn't know until the end, was that he was killed
recently and the edition of the book I read had the testimonials and
memorials from many who knew him, after the main body of the book.
While it's not traditional to bad-mouth people in that sort of
message, they couldn't say enough how good he was. He evidently
touched a lot of people's lives in a positive way.
Now, let's pretend that he's still
around so that I get the chance to warn you off this book in an
honest fashion, without feeling like I'm speaking ill of the dead.
It is jaw-dropping in its infantile
view of the world, the blind patriotism, the one-eyed religious
bigotry and the unexamined hypocrisy. It's sort of like Ronald Reagan
whispered his fevered fantasies into Donald Rumsfeld's ear, who then
in turn dictated them to Captain America's, Down-Syndrome brother.
The guy was far too happy about killing
people and dressing it up in patriotism. I understand that soldiers
gotta do what they gotta do, but he didn't see any problem with
calling in air-strikes that would flatten entire city blocks. There
is no way that only combatants were killed. He also mentions that
every time he looked through a scope, there were “bad guys” for
him to kill. Far more than any other snipers he was working with at
the same time. You know what that suggests to me? Yeah. They weren't
really all bad guys.
So, he loves killing “savages” to
protect Americans and their way of life, but gets on his high horse
when not everyone back home agrees with or supports what he and his
comrades do. Guess what, psycho - That's one of the major things
you're fighting to protect: The right to disagree.
The book is also extremely
disappointing in what it doesn't talk about. If you are going to read
one of these sorts of books, it's because you want to be a little bit
pervy and nerdy and you want to hear what an expert has to say on the
hows, whys and wherefores. As an example, he works with the Polish
GROM a lot. He respects them but says there were a lot of differences
in the way they did things. Then doesn't mention any of them. He's
always getting into bar fights. Always. He never mentions any detail.
Like I say, if you're reading a book about a SEAL, by a SEAL, you
would expect to hear how a professional soldier handles these things.
Nup.
He also says extraordinary things such
as; the reason he didn't wear a helmet, but preferred a baseball cap
on backwards, was because if you want to be cool, you have to look
it.
Nup. No. Never. That is almost exactly
the opposite of how real cool works.
Even more weird, is that it is just
plain dull. I don't know how you achieve that when you are facing
daily life-and-death situations but Chris Kyle and fellow writers
managed it.
The one shining achievement that stands
out for the American military machine, is the effectiveness of their
indoctrination.
The delicious, horrible, mortal irony
is that he was killed by one of his beloved comrades-in-arms, back
home in the US. If it didn't leave a grieving family, you'd almost
say it was poetic.
I will not be seeing the film.
