In 2002, NFL player Pat Tillman left his career in football to enlist in the United States army. He immediately became a symbol of the feelings of patriotism and national devotion that swept the country after September 11. Less than two years later, Tillman was killed in Afghanistan by friendly fire, creating panic for the brass of the U.S. army. How exactly was Tillman killed? What will happen when the public finds out? Will Tillman’s death damage the war effort?
The documentary The Tillman Story follows the efforts of Tillman’s family to determine what really happened during the final moments of Tillman’s life. After Tillman was killed, his family and the world were told that he died heroically, defending his fellow soldiers against insurgents. However, the real story soon leaked out. Tillman had been shot by an American soldier in a confused moment in an Afghan valley. What enraged Tillman’s family was the implication that the U.S. army had lied to try to create a hero out of their son, to use him as propaganda. After leaving the Arizona Cardinals to join the army, Tillman knew that he would inevitably be seen as an icon of patriotism, but he fought being reduced into a symbol or political sound bite as best he could. Seeing her son’s image co-opted posthumously, Tillman’s mother began digging into the details behind her son’s death to reclaim his identity from a military-created fiction.
Through a complex narrative, The Tillman Story tries to piece together the multifaceted implication of the life and death of Pat Tillman on the war, the inner-workings of the United States government, and Tillman’s personal identity. The strength of Amir Bar-Lev’s documentary is that it unfolds its highly politicized story in an un-didactic way. Rather than moving us along systematically towards a clear argumentative conclusion, The Tillman Story meanders, allowing various characters to tell their stories, jumping around in the timeline, and eventually allowing the total picture to emerge much as it did for the Tillman family – arriving through confusion slowly.
