Mediatrix, 2011

I find it difficult to pray, although in these apocalyptically depressing times, it is the most common piece of advice I’m given upon expressing my fear, sorrow and outrage at the current state of the world and my questionable place within it. But praying to an invisible entity makes me feel silly, and ultimately hollow. Let’s face it: the Christian deities aren’t exactly approachable. God is all big and old and stern an’ shit, lounging around Heaven in a white bathrobe and letting bad things happen. Jesus is okay, but he’s kinda preachy and he looks like that guy who hangs around the abandoned grocery store, roots through the trash and yells at you if you get too close to his cart. And is it just me, or do all of the angels seem really cranky, always throwing sinners into fiery pits and swinging swords around willy nilly? Out of all of them, only The Virgin Mary seems like she’d be cool to shoot the shit with. She’s always peacefully smiling and serene, never complaining, always rockin’ the blue babushka. And you just gotta respect a bitch who got knocked up at age fourteen and never once tried to get on a Reality TV show.

Director Cory Udler also seems to have noticed the Virgin’s penchant for hipness, and has given it a cool twist in his new film Mediatrix, based on the totally true life and times of uptight matron and terminal Wisconsin whackjob Mary Ann Van Hoof, who saw The Virgin Mary in her furniture and preached of a time when the faithful would leave Earth in a UFO to be with Jesus and some such shit. Udler wisely ditches the admittedly rather dull tale of the dairy farmer’s wife in the KMart muumuu’s and updated the tale to modern times, giving us a Van Hoof (here called Van Hook) covered in tattoos, pickling her internal organs and fucking greasy, scummy guys in her mom’s linen closet for cigarette money.

Mary’s mother isn’t too thrilled about the path her daughter has chosen to follow and frequently reminds Mary that she was a born healer, chosen by God to deliver the Word and prepare the Way. The truth is that Mary really IS chosen, and truly DOES have the power to communicate with the Blessed Virgin. But you know, getting raped by an incredibly foul and obese priest at a young age can totally sour one’s outlook on religion later in life. Tired of her mother’s constant nagging, Mary agrees to return to her “congregation” and there sees a chance to make some real money, instead of the odd twenty that the goon from the gas station throws her after a sloppy game of Slide the Salami up the Skin Chimney.

Mary sees a prime opportunity for both riches and revenge when she realizes that the ditzy little dumbbell who comes to see her for guidance is married to the pedophiliac slob who raped her all those years ago. Insinuating herself into their home and their lives, Mary soon takes over, convincing sweet little wifey that she’s the real Born Again deal and buying Father Earnest Porknine’s silence with sex, all the while plotting against them both. It’s just a matter of time, this she knows, for the Virgin Mary tells her so. You see, the Virgin hangs out with Mary all the time. It’s a constant slumber party in Van Hook’s bedroom. Dressed in knee highs and little skirts that have a dangerous habit of riding up and giving us a good look at their panties, Mary and Virg are getting their smoke on, drinking like Irish mourners, giggling obscenely and planning for the Day Of Reckoning with the help of the Father’s former henchmen whom Mary has brought around to her side, simply by spreading her legs. It’s either a really small town, or that bitch’s pussy is made of pure honey and high quality velvet (I ain’t talkin’ that cheapshit velour either), because NOBODY EVER turns her down.

 For roughly the first five minutes of film time, I was really, really worried, afraid that Mediatrix was going to hurt worse than planting my clit down on a hamburger grill. It looks cheap. It acts cheap. Oh wait, it IS cheap. And as a standard rule, cheap films always work better when those who make them do so with a self-deprecating sense of humor. Mediatrix is fucking hysterical. It’s nasty, messy, crude, blasphemous and trashy. If you left it out on your kitchen counter, it would grow black mold and leave a permanent stain on the faux marble finish. It leaves a raunchy taste in your mouth, not unlike the guy you just blew who has never eaten anything other than broccoli his whole entire life and has the unfortunate affliction of premature ejaculation. It smells like old bologna and yellow sweat stains on a Wal-Mart wifebeater. It is the definition of that stage that milk reaches, when it’s left out too long and not only has gone sour but is also on the verge of becoming jelly. It’s a form of grossness that I never previously knew existed outside of an equatorial outhouse.

Mediatrix is fun, if your idea of fun is pissing in the holy water fount before Sunday services. It’s over-the-top ridiculous and delusional and made me laugh out loud more than once, if only because the scenes between Mary and the Virgin seemed so natural and unscripted and reminded me very much of what it’s like to hang out with my own girlfriends. It’s also not as far fetched as it may sound, and presents a scathing comment on blind allegiance and willful ignorance in the name of God. But hey, what if God – as Joan Osborne once so tritely opined – was one of us? Just a slob like one of us?

I think this film answers that very question. And the thought of a trashy, whorey, chain-smoking, hard drinking, coke-snorting, self-fingering Saint makes me smile, and feel a little better about my place in the world.

And guess what? There is a sequel in the works!