"Pain is weakness leaving the body."


The new documentary Jerabek introduces us to a griefstruck Wisconsin family who've barely had time to compute the death of their 18-year old son Ryan on the battlefield in Iraq before another son, Nick, announces his intention to go fight. The loss of Ryan Jerabek is the main tragedy the film explores, through compelling interviews with friends, family and platoon-mates who remember him as a brave and natural leader. Another tragedy depicted, however, one which would never be apparent to the Jerabeks, is that their method of coping with Ryan's death -- turning their home into a depressing warehouse of Marine Corp. chachkes and losing themselves in a subculture of military boosterism -- is precisely what propels Nick into harm's way. A gaming addict with a limited imagination, Nick is never able to provide himself or anyone with a compelling reason why he would want to volunteer, but nevertheless the film eventually reaches a sad, quiet sort of climax as we see Nick walking into an absolutely deserted Marine recruiting station. A few minutes of talk and a cheesy indoctrination video seals the deal.

The interviews with Ryan's fellow Marines are vivid and tough, and as you might expect, they sometimes veer into the political, although most of their complaints about the Iraq war fall under the category of 'they didn't give us enough armor' and other such logistical criticisms, as opposed to conscientious objection. One of the Marines in particular shows an amazing capacity for naivete when he tells the interviewer, with the demeanor of a man betrayed, that he and his fellow Marines showed up with "soccer balls and candies" to give to the Iraqis, "and then they turned on us." It's through these Marines that the story of Ryan Jerabek's death is told -- an ambush by a cadre of well-armed insurgents that the surviving Marines believe could have been prevented, if they weren't ordered by their superiors to travel the same exact routes every day, broadcasting to any interested party where the platoon would be at any given time. In general, there's an undercurrent of bitterness from the Marines interviewed; a sense that Jerabek's death, while heroic, was somewhat meaningless.

The father of the Jerabek household, a gun hobbyist with a military background of his own, is presented as something of a victim of his own background; clearly enamored with and protective of his own sons, he also views hunting and militarism as the surest route to bonding with them. As the film opens, we see him hunting game birds with Nick and telling him "I'm not going to stand in your way -- you're 18," which almost sounds like subtle encouragement to go ahead and sign up, or something close to it. As for the mother, she's more adamant that her younger son not follow the path of the elder, but the strongest objection she can muster is "If something happens to you, I'll feel guilty that I didn't throw fits." Meanwhile, she continues to engage in rituals, such as arranging the family's dining table with little memorials of fallen Marines, unknown to the family personally, and lighting candles for them. When she's not doing that, she's preparing care packages to send overseas. Her impressionable children see everything, of course.

The family's loss eventually gains them some degree of national attention, and the parents meet with President Bush. This turns into another opportunity for the father to deliver one of his bromides -- he reports back to us that he told the President to "get the job done" which made a dent, I'm sure. The coverage of all of these events, and the smoothness of the timeline is a credit to first-time director Civia Tamarkin. Despite jumping from the tragedy in 2004 back to the present day events in 2005 and 2006, there's never a moment where we're not up to speed with what's going on or able to follow the emotional through-line that's set up. Tamarkin has a good feel for how to stay out of the way and let this story tell itself. I tend to think it might have benefited from some on-camera question and answer sessions between the filmmaker and the parents -- you feel a strong urge when watching it to question some of their decision-making, but you have to swallow that urge.

Taken simply as the biography of a fallen soldier, Jerabek is a powerful document; as it goes on, we begin to hear unexpected things about Ryan Jerabek from the interviewed Marines in his company, such as that he was in the habit of writing stories for the benefit of the other soldiers. Did he have a talent for writing? It seems possible based on what's said, and even the pictures we see of him suggest a writer's disposition, with his thick glasses and scrawny appearance. (Boot camp of course turns him into a burly mass of muscle) Would Jerabek have found some noteworthy calling outside of the armed services if he had only been lucky enough to make it through his tour? The evidence suggests he would have, which makes the film all the more sad and poignant -- it ends up convincing us that Jerabek was an intriguing individual who more than likely had a bright and worthwhile future ahead of him, all of which was extinguished during the course of one meaningless encounter with a group of Iraqi insurgents.