Bradley Cooper To Star In True Story Of US Sniper

Surprisingly, Bradley Cooper hasn’t done a lot of action roles. He should. The guy’s got the physicality and comes off convincingly enough whether he’s firing a gun or throwing punches. I quite enjoyed his turn in the under-appreciated remake of “The A-Team”.

So this counts as good news. Today, Warner Bros announced via The Hollywood Reporter that Cooper is set to star in and produce a project called “American Sniper”. The film is based on the true-life memoir of Navy SEAL Chris Kyle (written with Scott McEwen and Jim DeFelice).

The book is described like this: “He is the deadliest American sniper ever, called “The Devil” by the enemies he hunted and “The Legend” by his Navy SEAL brothers. From 1999 to 2009, U.S. Navy SEAL Chris Kyle recorded the most career sniper kills in United States Military history. The Pentagon has officially confirmed more then 150 of Kyle’s kills (the previous American record was 109), but it has declined to verify the astonishing total number for this book. Iraqi insurgents feared Kyle so much they named him Al-Shaitan (“the devil”) and placed a bounty on his head. Kyle earned a legendary status among his fellow SEALS, Marines, and U.S. Army soldiers, who he protected with deadly accuracy from rooftops and stealth positions. Gripping and unforgettable, Kyle’s masterful account of his extraodinary battlefield experiences of all time.

A native Texan who learned to shoot on childhood hunting trips with his father, Kyle was a champion saddle-bronc rider prior to joining the Navy. After 9/11, he was thrust into the front lines of the War of Terror, and soon found his calling as a world-class sniper who performed best under fire. In Fallujah, where he recorded a personal-record 2,100-yard kill shot, Kyle braved heavy fire to rescue a group of Marines trapped on the street; in Ramadi, he stared down insurgents with his pistol in close combat. Kyle talks honestly about the pain of war-of twice being shot and experiencing the tragic deaths of two close friends.”

I kinda dig sniper flicks, it’s always cool seeing how they put their craftiness and eagle eye to good use (not that I’m endorsing killing). The last great sniper film as far as I’m concerned is “Enemy At The Gates” with Jude Law. “American Sniper” sounds like it could be a cracking action pic under the right director. They’ve already got a solid leading man.