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Chapter five The Warrior While Tizoc no longer exists in his old physical form, something of his ancestral power continues to act in the lives of his human relatives and heirs (Read 1994, 43). During the 1950s and 1960s a dramatic image of an Aztec warrior holding his dying (or sleeping) lover circulated in thousands of calendars distributed in Texas. In the scene he looks noble, distinguished, and powerful. He is taking a moment to hold an irresistibly beautiful woman who lies in his arms with her eyes closed. Their image is elevated, as if they are on a mountain. Storm clouds are behind them. The woman looks at peace, her hands together almost as if she is praying. The warrior’s strength is evidenced in his stance, which remains powerful as he holds the reclining woman who either has fainted, is dying, has already died, or is only waiting for a kiss. The 1954 painting is Amor Indio, by Jesús Helguera, produced during his lifetime contract with a cigar factory.1 Paintings like Amor Indio were used to decorate calendars that advertised Mexican businesses. The calendars crossed the border with relatives or new immigrants. Texas Mexican businesses also began using the images for their calendars. Thousands of families had these calendars hanging in their homes. With the development of the Chicano civil rights movement in the 1960s, the image of the warrior and the sleeping (or dead) maiden became a symbol of the powerful past (and potent future) of Mexicans in the United States. Art historian Tere Romo describes a similar calendar painting titled La Noche Triste, also by Jesús Helguera, in her grandparents’ living room. In 1972 the Chicano rock group Malo appropriated Helguera’s Amor Indio for a new album cover, which spiraled the painting’s circulation beyond the Chicano movement.2 As I read Romo’s history of the painting I begin to recall the vivid colors of the warrior 111 Helguera’s painting on the album cover I saw thirty years previously. It was a rock group that helped me remember Amor Indio. Amor Indio: 1956 Two years after Helguera produced the painting, a second “Amor Indio” was released. This time it was a film titled Tizoc: Amor Indio. The director, Ismael Rodríguez, was internationally famous by the time he made Tizoc. Influenced by European and American directors, he must have been deeply enamored of either the historical Tizoc or the character Tizoc from the movie. He named one of his sons Tizoc.3 Pedro Infante, who continues to be the most popular Mexican singer/actor that has ever lived, portrayed the descendent of an Aztec (Méxica) ruler who fell tragically in love with a white upper-class woman. When the film won Berlin’s Silver Bear Award, the movie was described by the New York Times as a “drama about the color problem in Mexico.”4 The movie also won a Golden Globe Award for the best foreign film in 1957. It was considered the best of what was termed the “golden age of Mexican cinema.” In the movie, actor Pedro Infante plays the descendant of a sixteenthcentury Aztec prince. In the twentieth century, Infante’s Tizoc has dark skin (with the help of studio makeup). Four centuries after the conquest, Tizoc interacts meekly with his social superiors, with his head bowed as he talks. He is continuously guided by his parish priest. Ultimately (and tragically) he falls in love with a rich white woman. They both die in the end. Tizoc is portrayed as innocent and ignorant. The image of Tizoc stayed in the minds of many Texas mexicanos. Mexican movies traveled to Texas, where they were viewed by people in run-down, segregated movie theaters. In Fort Bend County, the Spanish-language movies were shown at the State Theatre in Rosenberg. It was a block from the railroad station and had originally been the theater for the city until the newer and more modern Cole Theatre was built two blocks farther away from the railroad tracks. At the Cole, Texas Mexicans had to sit in the balcony, and blacks were required to sit in the back part of the balcony. Whites sat on the ground level. At the State, there was no segregated seating. People could sit anywhere. The carpet and seats were torn. The place had a musty smell, not so much of dirt but of age. The screen was much smaller than the one at...

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