The Imposter

I've been on a bit of a documentary kick lately, which probably started with Bully.  That film left my wife and I teeming with rage.  Then I went back and rewatched Paradise Lost: The Child Murders at Robin Hood Hills, which led to the sequels, and here we are.  The Imposter is about a French man in his twenties who tricks the police, the government of Spain, customs officials, the FBI, a therapist, TV producers and personalities and a whole host of other idiots, primarily the Texas family themselves, into believing that he is their missing 16-year old son.  This is a ruse so elaborate and convoluted that it's completely impossible to believe, yet 100% true.  I'm not sure if the family is aware of how sad and pathetic this film makes them look, although I doubt they even understand.  Their desire to believe this man is their son, despite the fact that he has a French accent and talks like Georges St. Pierre, has dark hair that is obviously died blonde to appear more like their son Nicholas, dark eyes which he says were colored with "a solution" by his abusive captors, and is clearly older than 16, is disturbing and pitiful on so many levels. Eventually it takes a good ol' boy private investigator (apparently the only sane man involved in this entire mess) realizing it's not the same person due to the SHAPE OF HIS EARS before the truth can come to light.  At one point, after being warned by the therapist that this man was NOT their son and could very well be dangerous, the sister ignores the warning and takes him back home.  I just can't even...wow.  The same sister mind you who uttered the line "Spain...isn't that like, across the country?"  I doubt the filmmaker's intent was to provide the viewer with any laugh out loud moments but there were so many due to the naivete and stupidity of the people caught up in this farce.  When the fake Nicholas' true identity comes to light it's revealed that he's perpetrated dozens of these frauds and is wanted by Interpol.  There's a very interesting subplot where the imposter accuses the family of murdering their son, which reopens the investigation, although that goes nowhere.  The implication being that the family knew he wasn't the son because they killed him but overlooked it to protect their lie, but that doesn't hold water with me because the case was dead, no one was looking for this kid and the last thing someone guilty of murder would want is for more attention to be drawn on them, which is precisely what happened.  Although that also assumes you're taking normal human behavior and logic into account, neither of which this sad family displayed very much of.  The story has also been turned into a feature film called The Chameleon but I can't imagine it's even remotely as compelling and strange as the The Imposter.