#2,103: American Sniper

Wingsuit Warrior - ★½☆☆☆  
You should probably just watch 45 minutes of wingsuit videos on YouTube instead.

Jake Shimabukuro: Life on Four Strings - ★★☆☆☆  
You should probably just watch 45 minutes of Jake Shimabukuro performing on YouTube instead. Good soundtrack.

Jimmy Carr: Laughing and Joking - ★★★☆☆  
Compared to a lot of the comedy I see, it's kind of refreshing to see someone saying horrible things on purpose. There were more than a few lines that I hear a lot, which I would have assumed were just hacky street jokes, but for all I know they were his in the first place.  

American Sniper - ★★★☆☆
The first half of this (at least) was like the opposite of movie magic to me. I just couldn't stop seeing it as footage of actors walking around on different sets. I've read the reviews that said this should have dealt more with a) the enemy sniper or b) the wife, but I thought that a) they actually did a nice job showing Mustafa's parallels without beating us over the head, and b) Miller couldn't carry the scenes she had; more would have been terrible.

One one hand, I think it was too soon to make this movie. Too close to the life of the actual man. I never thought it was going to be a particularly subtle or nuanced portrait, but the movie still lays it on pretty thick with what an unimpeachably wonderful person he was. And then it introduces a half dozen characters to verbally confirm his wonderfulness.

On the other, The Hurt Locker is six years old and better in every way. The biography here gets in the way of the movie.