I spent the evening at a screening of a soon-to-be-released HBO documentary about Sergio Vieira de Mello, the legendary international diplomat. It’s based on Samantha Power’s remarkable book exploring de Mello’s career as the apotheosis of a breed of diplomat emerging in the latter stages of the Cold War that husbands the United Nations in the service of human rights. You should read her book.

The documentary, Sergio, well… It’s an exquisitely made film, and genuinely moving. But in emphasis and in narrative, it’s a film about the horrific death of Sergio Vieira de Mello, with his life in the background and his mission barely visible from the horizon. de Mello died on August 19, 2003 when Abu Musab al-Zarqawi orchestrated a devastating attack on the U.N. compound in Baghdad, where de Mello was U.N. special representative. Every aspect of the attack and its aftermath, culminating three and a half hours later with de Mello’s agonizing death, is explored in the documentary. No other aspect of his career receives the same treatment.

Samantha Power is the public intellectual I respect the most, and who has had perhaps the greatest single influence on the way I view the world. You should read her book. You’ll learn a great deal about de Mello, the circumstances he confronted and the changes in international diplomacy that he represented. It’s a shame you’ll get the vague outlines of the causes to which de Mello staked his life from a clearly well-intentioned film.