I did not bother to watch Sniper and my comment is only an educated guess why Sniper was such a success and Kathryn Bigelow's Hurt Locker was a flop. For the Americans there is intrinsic impossibility to understand moral ambiguity. Here are heroes; and there are enemies. That's what the public wants.
Hurt Locker shows a deep deformation of psyche in course of the war up to complete inability to adapt to civilian life and code of conduct. Poor Kathryn overestimated intelligence of American viewing public and its ability for compassion. What is needed is a perfect gladiator who entrenches in the viewers in their comfortable seat the fundamental righteousness of their cause and worldview.
