American Magazine March 2015

half hour into Fort Bliss, Claudia
A Myers’s emotionally stirring
film released late last year, Staff
Sergeant Maggie Swann, wearing
green army fatigues and a guarded
look, walks into the office of her new
commanding officer. She’s a medic
and single mother who has returned
to Texas from a tour of duty in
Afghanistan to discover her bond with
her 5-year-old son has been broken.
She’s also recently reenlisted.
“So how does it feel, to be
back a second time around?”
the officer asks.
“It’s always an adjustment, sir,”
responds Swann, played by Michelle
Monaghan of True Detective fame.
“I always say, coming home’s a lot
harder than going to war,” he says.
“So many damn expectations.”
The weight of those expectations,
shouldered by both soldiers and
their loved ones, is at the heart
of Myers’s film, which she
wrote, directed, and produced.
It received critical acclaim
during its limited theatrical run—
including the audience award
at the Champs-Élysées Film
Festival—and it’s now streaming
on Netflix and available on
iTunes and Amazon.
In the tradition of cominghome-from-war
classics like The
Best Years of Our Lives, The Deer
Hunter, and even this year’s smash
hit American Sniper, Fort Bliss
aims to capture how everyday
life unfolds after the euphoria
of familial reunion wears off.
(Unlike previous movies, it does
so from the perspective of a
female lead character.)
“It’s not just the reunion we
see at the homecomings,” says
Myers, a School of Communication
professor. “That’s actually just
the very beginning of a long and
complicated journey for people to
get to know each other again when
both have changed.”
She became interested in the
topic after making a training film
for the army about leadership
at the junior officer level and a
documentary for the VA on the
evolution of women’s roles in the
military. During those projects,
she forged relationships with
veterans and their families,
and realized the gulf that exists
between their expectations
and reality.
“I believe that most people
don’t see or grasp the social
impact of war,” Myers says.
“When a soldier deploys, the
family’s at war, too. They have
their own stresses and their own
challenges. When the family is
back together, it’s disruptive in
a way, and it’s difficult. Everyone
is affected.”
THE MAJORITY OF
HOMELESS VETERANS
ARE SINGLE MEN WHO
LIVE IN URBAN AREAS AND
SUFFER FROM MENTAL
ILLNESS, ALCOHOL OR
SUBSTANCE ABUSE,
OR BOTH; 40% ARE
BLACK OR HISPANIC.
Sources:
National Coalition
for Homeless
Veterans, US
Department
of Housing
and Urban
Development,
US Department
of Veterans
Affairs
to exhale. That’s an impulse. It’s an impulse
similar to anger, rage, whatever. Your body is
always communicating with you. The trick is
to learn how to listen to it.”
It took King, SPA/BA ’03, CAS/MA ’10,
several years to heed his own advice. Always
fascinated with guns, war movies, and
societal ideals of masculinity, he joined the
army while a student at AU and deployed
in 2006. On New Year’s Eve he was driving
down a South Baghdad road he’d been on a
thousand times before.
“I looked back at the lieutenant who came
with us and said, ‘I bet you didn’t think you’d
be spending New Year’s in a Humvee,’” he
recalls. “Then it was, boom!” His voice
explodes and he smacks his hands together.
“Time stood still. There was a bright
flash—heat, rocks, dirt, and metal came
rushing in my face. I remember thinking,
‘Close your eyes.’ I remember pain in my leg,
pain in my hand, pain in my groin. I opened
my eyes slowly and there was blood all over
me. The guy in the turret was bleeding out
of his face, and the guy in the back was
screaming about his neck. I was medevaced
to the Green Zone where they took care of
my injuries. I sustained burns and lacerations
to my leg and hand and blunt force trauma to
my left testicle.”
26 AMERICAN MAGAZINE MARCH 2015