Truth Be Not Proud

I don't get to the theater anymore, and by theater I mean the movies, lest you think Ferrerman is some kinda elitist artsy type all of a sudden. The thing is really that most films make it out of the theaters and onto Netflix or cable quick enough. The second run film market isn't what it was years ago, so most films wind up in our living rooms pretty quick. I'm a patient Ferrer, one that doesn't like crowds or people other than me talking to the screen.

War films and Clint Eastwood works were usually an exception though. This Xmas offered a promising one on both counts, however I'm still waiting to see "American Sniper". I've been reading about it though...

It's the fact based story of highly decorated Navy SEAL sniper, Chris Kyle, who was murdered awhile back by a fellow Iraq war veteran, a Marine who suffered from PTSD, from his own service in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Kyle had 160 plus documented kills as a sniper. The "plus" would suggest that there were more that the Navy couldn't (or wouldn't?) verify. Not sure. He was the most prolific sniper in the history of the Navy and, perhaps, all the branches of US service. He is the stuff of legends.

Within legends, however, there are often lies. Kyle also claimed to have killed 30 armed looters after Katrina in New Orleans. He claimed to have killed two armed carjackers in Texas. In his book he claimed to have punched out former SEAL and ex-Minnesota governor, Jesse Ventura. Jesse sued while Kyle was alive and did not drop the suit upon Kyle's death. A jury found that Kyle had lied, and they found that Ventura had been defamed. I think they awarded him $1.6 million? That's show biz. Lest you think he took food off the table of a widow and orphans, there was a book and movie deal initiated well before his death. They are cared for.

I'll probably enjoy the film when I get around to it. Eastwood is a better director than he was an actor and he was a pretty good actor. The film doesn't address Kyle's truth issues and that's certainly a director's option telling any story. Telling the story doesn't mean telling THE story.

I am curious as to why such a prolific killer would lie. Why taint your record with fanciful falsehoods when the truth is so bloody awesome? The liars that I have known weren't bad people but they were nowhere near as good as their claims and it was easy for me to see why they lied. They wanted to fluff themselves up to look important or dangerous because they were anything but.

Kyle was important and dangerous and had the portfolio to actually prove it. There was no need for him to spice it up or fabricate as he did. With his death we lost any real insight into why he fibbed. Taking 160 lives- even under the justifiable domain of war- has to torment anyone's psyche. Likely he suffered from PTSD just as his killer did. They say Kyle liked killing. He certainly was good at it. Yet he saw fit to embellish his killing.

It's odd. It doesn't sound like he was conflicted. A guilty conscience might have caused him to save lives or embellish stories of saving lives to ease that conscience and square him in the taking of so many lives. Such was the still popular urban legend of the late Mr Rogers that had the genteel kid's TV show star being a decorated Navy SEAL himself, who turned to religion and passivity to ease his own conscience. Look it up on Snopes. Great story but, not the least bit true. You would just like to believe it was though.

I guess many would like to have seen Kyle redeem himself in a similar manner. Not Kyle himself though. He just couldn't get enough until enough got him.