Jim Mendiola was inspired by Mexican ex-votos–small paintings on tin traditionally left on altars as tokens of gratitude to saints–when he created Molly Vazquez, the DIY dream girl at the center of his first film, Pretty Vacant. Molly’s got a million pokers in the fire. She’s made a couple Super-8 films and leads an all-Chicana punk band called Aztlan-a-Go-Go. But her zine, called Ex-Voto, is clearly closest to her heart. “The medium was perfect: cheap, easy–no matter how I messed with the pictures, I found they always came out great xeroxed,” she gushes, speaking for a whole generation of copy-machine Conde Nasts. Mendiola says the ex-votos, also called retablos, “are pure and nonintellectualized artistic expressions of faith and hope and joy that I wanted to resemble Molly’s own reasons and motivation for her own simple expression in life–her zine.”
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Mendiola will be present at tonight’s 7 PM screening of Pretty Vacant at Tres en Uno, 1769 W. Greenleaf. Admission is $5; call 773-764-8634. The film will be shown again at 7 on Sunday at Calles y Suenos, 1900 S. Carpenter. It’s $5; call 312-243-4243. –John Sanchez
