Sunday, April 12, 2026 at 7:00 PM
Hammer Museum, Los Angeles
Considered the first Chicano feature, Efraín Gutiérrez’s landmark independent film *Please, Don’t Bury Me Alive! *(*¡Por favor, no me entierren vivo!*) was believed lost for years until UCLA Distinguished Professor Chon Noriega tracked down the director and relocated elements to the UCLA Film & Television Archive, where collaborative restoration efforts brought the film back to life. Incorporating Chicano forms of popular theater and music, the bilingual film offers a rhythmic, in-depth look at 1970s-era South Texas Chicano culture, as its central character questions his place in a society that undervalues Latinos, so many of whom had been killed in the Vietnam War. A historic, influential hit in regional theaters, the film’s tremendous impact on Chicano cinema was further cemented in 2014, when it was named to the National Film Registry for its historic, cultural, and artistic significance. Today, in a moment when visibility itself can feel precarious, the film’s call to live boldly in defiance of erasure resonates as powerfully as it did 50 years ago. Director: Efraín Gutiérrez. Screenwriter: Sabino Garza. With: Efraín Gutiérrez, Josefina Paz, David Moss.