S.O.S. Note

Until now, no plausible explanation of this mention of an injury in his S.O.S. note has been put forth (interestingly, the S.O.S. note was completely ignored by the Penn film…though the idea that he signs his real name here was employed, inaccurately, on the goodbye note that we see near the end of the movie). In any case, the best explanation that anyone has ever been able to come up with is that he either made it up (which doesn’t really fit when you think about who Chris was), or that he perhaps suffered a leg laceration of some sort, something that wouldn’t show up by the time of the autopsy. All along, most everyone had imagined it must have been, if anything, a leg injury that prevented him from walking out, and had never considered, counterintuitively, that it was an arm or shoulder injury. This type of injury, too, already healing somewhat, as indicated in is his final self portraits (his right arm slightly raised), is also something that would not likely show up in an autopsy. Of course, as stated in the documentary, this piece of evidence is by no means definitive, and our attempts to reproduce this visual effect were in the end inconclusive; although it was easier to get an empty-sleeved shirt to look like this photo, it was also possible to achieve this look with an arm still in the sleeve. And thus this image could be simply an illusion, a trick of light and shadow and posture. It could simply be a figment of the imagination. And yet, that being said, once you do see this aspect of the photo for the first time, it is difficult to ever look at it the same way again—it’s hard not to conclude you are indeed looking at an empty sleeve. Be that as it may, and as speculative as it is, it was included in the documentary for the sole reason that it was noticed, that it might help explain the mystery of the S.O.S. note, and that we wanted to open it up for further investigation and debate.