"The Short Life of José Antonio Gutierrez" | Giving dignity to soldier's death

As the American death toll in Iraq nears 3,300, the German documentary "The Short Life of José Antonio Gutierrez" offers a moving reminder that the first name on that ever-growing list was a good-natured Guatemalan in pursuit of the American dream. When José Antonio Gutierrez was killed in Iraq (presumably by friendly fire) on March 21, 2003, he was one of countless illegal Latino "green-card soldiers" who traded military service for U.S. citizenship.

He dreamed of becoming an architect, enlisting in the Marines to support his education. Orphaned during Guatemala's lengthy civil war (waged by army juntas with U.S. support), he was the streetwise survivor of a sad and lonely childhood, passing through foster families and briefly reuniting with a long-lost sister before trekking north on the Pan-American Highway, jumping the Mexico-U.S. border and living homeless in Los Angeles until a social worker helped turn his life around. After his death, his hard-luck story was given a typically uplifting spin on the nightly news, and faulty record-keeping resulted in an erroneous birth date on his gravestone that has yet to be corrected.

Swiss-born filmmaker Heidi Specogna honors Gutierrez's life not simply by tracing its hard-scrabble path, but by expanding its scope to represent all green-card warriors and their essential threads in America's fabric. Their stories are made manifest by this one: "José Antonio Gutierrez," notes the Guatemala consul in Los Angeles, "is such a familiar story."

Specogna compassionately tells this story as a kind of existential travelogue, enlisting those who knew Gutierrez to humanize the factual details, from street friends to social workers, foster parents and fellow Marines. What emerges from this impeccably cinematic portrait is an unforgettable tale of hope and tenacity, dashed against the blunt reality of war in Iraq.

The ultimate irony is that the first U.S. casualty there was an illegal immigrant fighting a foreigner's war with hopes for a better future.

Jeff Shannon: j.sh@verizon.net