Shooter

Shooter is the movie that made me love Mark Wahlberg. Whereas American Sniper was a high action character study with a real life disjointed story, Shooter is high action fast paced conspiracy story with an alright character.

Shooter follows the story of Bobby Lee Swagger (played by Mark Wahlberg) a Marine Scout Sniper known for his incredible accuracy and deadliness.

At the beginning of the movie, Swagger and his partner (Lane Garrison) are behind enemy lines in Ethiopia. When they are abandoned by the government, his partner is killed. After this Swagger leaves the Marines and lives the life of a hermit, until he's recruited by a shady organization, headed by Danny Glover, to help them prevent an assassination attempt on the life of the President.

Swagger initially says no but his sense of honor comes to him and he takes the job, scouting out possible locations, and mapping out the angles and distance for the shot. This is the really interesting parts about the film, when they start talking about the conditions of Scout Snipers and the requirements to make shots from incredible distances.

Where it gets interesting is when Swagger is framed for the assassination that actually goes through and kills, not the President, but the Archbishop of Ethiopia. Suddenly, a conspiracy is set a foot with Swagger as the patsy and a manhunt going after him. The fun part is, that the film plays out like the JFK assassination, talks of conspiracies and how they are dealt with, how they are followed through on, it gets really interesting. So you've got two really good topics, sniping and conspiracies all wrapped up in this action filled movie. Its a great set up.

Wounded and without any assets, Swagger must find a way to unravel the conspiracy and clear his name. He recruits the help of his dead partner's widow(played by Kate Mara), and a disgraced FBI agent (played by Michael Pena) to track down the people who framed him and discover the conspiracy.

This movie is a lot of fun.

Its a lot of crazy high paced action and there's no really anybody better to head up this film than Mark Wahlberg.

Its probably not a movie that is anywhere close to winning any awards but if you're looking for a fun action flick, this is a perfect movie just for that. Its pretty ridiculous at times but its a damn good time.

Wahlberg brings his cool guy attitude like he does to everything. Michael Pena is a good side character. Kate Mara in her earlier days is good enough although prior to House of Cards I wouldn't have thought much of her, especially with this film. Danny Glover is a lot of fun in this film as the main bad guy.

For me, this movie doesn't have to be incredibly good, its just a fun flick. That's really all I can say about this film. Its not a film interested in starting a franchise or trilogy (at least it doesn't seem like it is). Its just a standalone film. There's a lot of dialogue in the film, a lot of ideas that the film could be discussing but gives up for a lot of good action. There's a line near the end of the film where they say, "This isn't the Wild West where you can clean up the streets with a gun, even though sometimes thats exactly what's needed".

Its not exactly the most intelligent moral or the most intelligent movie ever. But I really don't think it needs to be. Would it be kind of fun to see Mark Wahlberg in this role again, sure, but its not needed.

The ending is a little abrupt and again, not the most intelligent ending ever brought about. But as I've said multiple times, this movie is just fun. Call it a guilty pleasure, call it a shitty movie, but I love Shooter.

But those are my thoughts on Shooter. What do you think? Did you enjoy Shooter? Comment and Discuss below! Also Follow Me on Twitter @cmhaugen24 and shoot me a tweet on what you'd like to see me review.

I'll leave you with this. Like this movie, Marky Mark is just down right fun. Every time I review a movie with Mark Wahlberg I really want to put Mark Wahlberg talking to animals... but I can't get that video to show on here. Instead, here's a lot of funny Mark Wahlberg moments.