An I for an Eye*
*Title borrowed from Peggy Robles Alvarado’s poem, “An I for an Eye.” Sub-headings below marked with an asterisk (*) are from the poem too.
A galaxy of storytelling / to adjust to darkness*
“San Miguel Arcángel” (Belie Belcan) by Chiqui Mendoza
Ever since I can remember, I was fascinated by the unseen; the sounds you can hear in the other room, the things that moved in the shadows, the mysteries that lie on the other side of life. I tried so hard to see it even as it remained stubbornly unseen. It’s no wonder that I was drawn to magic, religions and spirits. From Catholicism to Voodoo, Santeria, Palo, Buddhism, Hinduism, ancient myths, and esoteric cults. If it contained mysteries, rituals, and symbols, I was in. I think this was my way of dealing with the fear of death that gripped me at the age of 6 or 7, when I realized not only could my parents die but so could I. (I’m witnessing my 7-year old son having the same revelations) “What happens when I die?” “How will I die?” Over the years, I have found some satisfying answers in spirituality, philosophy and science but the questions still pop up in unexpected places. Like when I found out that a young woman in my extended family had been struck with cancer, out of nowhere. She was in her early 20s then and I couldn’t stop thinking what that must be like. To suddenly be faced with those mortal questions and not having the privilege of old age to to shield you with some answers. But Death comes quick y ya; it’s done. It was wondering about her and what thought and went through that led me to write the script for Lo Que Pasó, Pasó (LQP,P). You see maybe it’s that I am not as religious as I feel I could be, so I resort to art to channel my questions, desires, fears and anxieties. And here we are…
All my Gods are the color of mud*
“Dos Figuras Magica Para un Gaga” by Chiqui Mendoza
Growing up in the United States, meant being my mom’s interpreter at the age of 6 or 7 (around the time I was realizing my mortality; go figure…). It also meant absorbing the culture of the West (aka USA and Western Europe) in all its greatness, from high to low, while internalizing the lesson that anything that was not of the West was inferior. I didn’t want to hear merengue or any type of Spanish music because that meant we had to do chores. I wanted hip hop and house music and rock instead (mind you, at the time, these were still beneath the views of our West’s elites but at least they were “American,” which placed them atop any Spanish music in my teenage hierarchy). I wanted my MTV and my Video Music Box. Of course that also meant I wanted movies like Indiana Jones and Terminator and dubbed kung fu flicks. As I grew a moustache, I became more sophisticated, into edgy video art on public access and the artsier foreign stuff from Europe and Japan I’d come across at Virgin or HMV. It was in college that I rediscovered the dopeness of being Dominican and I set my sights on not only enjoying music in Spanish but also finding films from Latin America, everything from the experimental to the commercial just to find great expressions of my latin identity. Hell, even Chesperito and Sabado Gigante tv shows, with all of their cringe moments, took on an air of higher cultural meaning. So, here I am now making a short film about 4 Dominican-American women that draws on all these year of experience into a sancocho of art and culture, high and low, from the West and the East and all the places in between. Everything I’ve absorbed ever since I sat on my father’s lap to watch old Popeye cartoons before mami took me to daycare. Some of that stuff is apparent and obvious to me like the movies and TV shows that influence LQP,P: Mulholland Drive, Cure, Cocote, I Knew Her Well, The Curse, Twin Peaks. And some of that stuff is subtle and insidious; hiding and waiting for a viewer to uncover one day. Who knows? Sometimes it’s better to say less. One thing I know for sure, is that I want to do these films right so that the brown kid I was, and others like him, don’t have to ever feel inferior.
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