This afternoon I met a friend to watch Monster. Oy, was that one heavy trip of a movie. I’ve read a number of reviews, some praising it to the hills, others contending it portrayed the real-life Lee Wuornos as a cariciature or a heroine. Wuornos apparently contradicted her story many times and made preposterous comments; for example, she claimed to have had sex with 250,000 men — such a feat would require relations with 35 men daily for two decades.

On the other hand, just looking at photos one can see the obviously difficut life she had. Wuornos was born in 1956; her father was a child molester and sociopath who later committed suicide. Her mother divorced him just before Wuornos was born and later left her and brother Keith with the grandparents, who adopted them (but did not reveal their true relationship until Lee was 12, and she subsequently rebelled against them); they were strict and physically abusive. Keith died of cancer at age 21. The grandmother, an alcoholic, committed suicide. By age 14 Wuornos had given birth (the child was put up for adoption); she quit school, began living on the streets, and turned tricks before she was old enough to drive a car.

If all this sounds too horrific to be real, think again. I’ve counseled numerous people who experienced abuses that stretch one’s capacity to comprehend. How can humans be so evil to others? What causes some to react violently? The movie did an admirable job portraying the desperate resignation permeating Wuornos’s worldview. In Monster, after she began murdering men, when her lesbian lover found out, Wuornos talked about how people are killed every day, that it’s all just fighting to survive or to the death. She claimed she was trying to protect Selby (in real life Tyria Moore) — to provide for and take care of her so Selby could retain her hopeful perspective about life. Wuornos’s raw bravado and macho stance as the breadwinner is painful to watch. After the first murder, she made an attempt to quit hooking and find a regular job. However, she was clueless about the type of effort needed to achieve her grand (or grandiose) goals. Having no skills and a felony record, everywhere Wuornos turned she was rejected, and not gently. Her response to that was an escalation of ever-present belligerance, desperation, and rage.

The movie didn’t, in my view, glorify her motives. Nor did it ask the viewer to excuse or forgive Wuornos because on her nightmarish origins. She was not likable, even in the moments she was portrayed as happy with Selby. She was a woman degraded and dehumanized by circumstances and who responded in kind.

So what’s the attraction of such a movie? Well, in part it’s the docudrama aspect of it. In fact, a documentary was released in 1992 about her life. Because female serial killers are rare, such a person garners a lot of curiosity and attention. It was a sad movie to watch, a testament to the millions of people who have traversed a similar path, all because of having the bad luck to be born into terrible circumstances — though most do not respond accordingly. I suppose the movie serves as a reality check for many people, to remind us that there but for Grace go we.

Aileen Wuornos was executed in October 2002. You can read more about her life here.