ThisFunktional
PAGE
09
T
Library of Congress inducts first Lati
Written by
Jesus Figueroa
Staff Writer
“Please, Don’t bury Me Alive,” by writer-director
Efrain Gutierrez, is inducted by the Library of
Congress to the National film registry as the first
Latino feature film in Dec. 2014.
Gutierrez lived a quiet existence away from
mainstream film making since 1979.
University of California, Los Angeles professor
Chon Noriega searched for filmmaker Gutierrez for
years before Gutierrez reached out to Noriega in 1996.
Noriega hoped to archive the film in the UCLA
archives, but he could not find a copy.
“The film was in a garage at a friends house,”
Gutierrez said.
The film was almost lost. A month after recovering
the film the garage it was found in caught on fire and
burnt down.
“This film started in 1972, but it wasn’t finished
until 1976,” Noriega said.
When the film screened it did better than anyother
film, where it was shown.
“When it opened it started out performed all the
other films in south Texas,” Noriega said.
Guitierrez started pursuing his dreams in 1970 with
ambition to be an actor and moved to Los Angeles,
Calif. where he attended East Los Angeles College.
While at ELAC, Gutierrez had good opportunities
to become an actor.
He auditioned for an Americanized western cowboy
role, but was told they wanted him to be more
Mexican.
He found the piece he wanted to audition with and
took it in for his audition.
“At the time ‘Yo soy Joaquin,’ I am Joaquin, was
very popular. So I read ‘Yo soy Joaquin’ by Rodolfo
Gonz