Sniper: Reloaded (2011)

Really? A love scene with a bad actress that the main character hardly knows. WTF?! This is a Sniper movie. Why is a British blonde on the disciplinary committee having sex with a soldier she's investigating? This is just bad writing and has no place in what should be a tough-as-nails Sniper movie. Bad acting all around. Worse script. Stupid scenes. Marines lifting weights and talking about nothing. Stock footage cut in by some dumb-ass movie executive who thinks this makes the movie seem "bigger" I guess. Wrong. It makes it look smaller, cheaper. A helicopter lands on the grass in front of some cheap looking building. Why? No one gets in or out. Is this supposed to open the movie up and show us some military hardware? It didn't work. It's a meaningless shot with no relationship to the story. And bad action. Poorly shot. Poorly staged. Marine charge out of a storage container to an almost certain death and fire at a sniper they can't see, peeling off meaningless rounds. Who thinks of this incomprehensible garbage? Who says "yeah, it's good let's make it." Billy Zane chewing the scenery is unbearable. The young Beckett was the only thing in the movie that didn't make me cringe. I love movies. I'm even forgiving most of the time. But this is really poorly done from inception to execution. There is no forgiveness for this one, no matter what the budget. Tom Berenger where are you when we need you? I hated this movie. One of the worst DVD movies in recent memory.

Almost every guy I've known has seen the original "Sniper" movie and enjoyed it, despite it's cheesiness. The original was a TV movie with corny acting, yet it became a well known classic that set forth the role of the modern military sniper. It focused on the technicalities of the sniping profession. I never wrote an IMDb review before, but I decided to share my brief thoughts because its low IMDb star-rating might deter viewers who would miss out."Sniper: Reloaded" may not have memorable sniping/sharpshooting kill shot scenes like "Full Metal Jacket", "Enemy at the Gates", Saving Pvt Ryan", etc. However, it gives the viewer some romanticized insight to the sniping profession. That is what made the first movie so interesting. We will always remember the scenes about peeing in parasite infested rivers and smudging feces on the face to evade search dogs. "Sniper: Reloaded" teaches us similar macho lessons. Its an educational experience, even if it is an improbable survival lesson. The movie begins with Beckett's son, a US Marine Sgt, that is deployed to Africa to train the Congolese Army as part of some UN thing. Without spoiling the plot, Beckett's fire team is sent to rescue a VIP plantation owner when a mysterious rebel sniper pins down the group. The sniper pwns the whole squad, picking them off one by one. Beckett Jr is shot and left for dead, but is later rescued by a big game European poacher. The news reaches Richard Miller (Billy Zane from the old movie) who is now a veteran CIA spook and shooting instructor at Ft Benning sniper school. Miller is now portrayed differently. He isn't the same effeminate bureaucrat that wore Ray Bans and a silk scarf during a jungle mission. This time he looks like an old veteran killer. He's buffer and balder than he looked 20 yrs ago, but still has some eccentric flair because he now rocks an anchor mustache. This time he's got the cool fallacious phrases like "One Shot, One Kill!"Apparently, Miller is a master that teaches a new generation of elite snipers how to excrete their urinary and bowel movements while aiming a rifle. I'm not making that up. Its these insightful situations that make "Sniper" films a must watch "man" movie. Miller then gets interrupted by an urgent telegram in the middle of the lesson that summons him to Africa.Miller arrives in Africa to manipulate Beckett's vengeful son. Miller tells Beckett the true identity of the enemy sniper and how to take him out. Its a reuse of the classic "Sniper" scene, in which Beckett Sr tells rookie Miller the identity of the skilled jungle sniper. Beckett Jr then embarks in an unofficial vendetta against double agents and govt assassins. I rated this movie an 8/10 because it was a decent and enjoyable foreign film(I think it was foreign). We see some interesting stuff like creating sniper dummies, and evading night vision scopes which I found more interesting than the fictional characters. Its not a great movie, but it is definitely worth watching.

Sorry for the short review, but I just don't see what to write about. This is simply one of the worst cheap and uninspired movies I've ever seen in my life. Yes, it might be OK for 1940's, but for 2011 even I could do a better job. All actors are awful, and absolutely everything that happens in this movie is completely unrealistic. It even gets to a point when in the beginning of the movie you first see the colonel and hear the footsteps of the two soldiers coming in, but when the camera shows them they just start walking from a wall opposite to the entrance into the room. I fast-forwarded through most of the movie because I just couldn't handle the absence of talent in everything in this movie, starting with the composer and ending with the director. Berenger's face and the ant in the beginning, as one of the reviewers mentioned, were the best parts of the movie, if there were any at all.

I was about to write a detailed review on this but Matt-441 said it all... i totally agree with him.... with no super-duper stars, this movie really hits the very best of Genre in recent times... Me, i like movies where i can go inside the screen and be in the movie. I didn't move an inch watching this one...Script was well written, acting was way above average.. sound effects are key to the sniper movies, sound rocked in this movie!!!... what else?? scenery... it is based in Africa so what not to expect? beautiful views of jungle, Elephants, Rhinos, Giraffes etc... it is worth watching in short...