The actor, who plays a sniper in the war movie directed by Clint Eastwood, comments on heated debates surrounding the movie at Academy Awards nominees luncheon.
- Feb 3, 2015
AceShowbiz - Bradley Cooper did not expect that "American Sniper" would spark heated political debates. The actor who plays U.S. Navy SEAL Chris Kyle, the most lethal sniper in U.S. military history, commented on political discussions around the movie during the Academy Awards nominees luncheon on Monday, January 2.
Speaking to media at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, Cooper said, "You never know when you make a movie if anybody's going to see it, so to have the audacity to think that it would cause any sort of effect at all would be pretty presumptuous." He added, "Any discussion that sort of sheds light to the plight of the soldiers and the men and women in the armed services, for that discussion to occur is fantastic."
In a separate interview with NPR, Cooper who is up for Best Actor trophy at the 87th Annual Academy Awards previously mentioned that the debates distracted people from the movie's message about veterans. "The fact that it's inciting a discussion that has nothing to do with vets - and it's more about the Iraq War and what we did not do to indict those who decide to go to the war - every conversation in those terms is moving farther and farther away from what our soldiers go through, and the fact that 22 vets commit suicide each day," he said. "The amount of people that come home is so much greater because of medical advancement and ... we need to take care of them."
The Clint Eastwood-directed movie has been enjoying success at the box office. It topped the chart for third week straight with $30.68 million, according to the final number recorded on Monday. As the revised number is revealed, it means that the box office record for Super Bowl weekend remains on "Hannah Montana/Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert Tour". The movie collected $31.1 million in 2008.
