“Punishment is absolute.
Punishment is necessary. ...Punishment is good.”
We all have our little
holiday traditions, don’t we? While so many like to sing along to their
favorite Christmas standards performed by the likes of Bing Crosby ans Nat King
Cole, I prefer to rock out to the shrill wail of The Crypt-Keeper as he shrieks
such classics as “Deck the Halls with Parts of Charlie” and “We Wish You’d Bury
the Missus” (both featured on the dementedly delightful Tales from the Crypt
Presents: Have Yourself a Scary Little Christmas album). While some like to
kick back and revisit It’s a Wonderful Life (the movie title I couldn’t,
for the life of me, remember while originally recording this episode), I always
revisit Silent Night, Deadly Night, sometimes all five of ‘em. Most
holiday-themed movies are just too damned wholesome, so it always warms the
cockles of my little black heart to watch a bloodied axe blade decapitate a
snowman lovingly assembled by orphaned children.
Though I’d always had an
affinity for all things horror, there was once a part of me that temporarily
set aside dismemberment and decapitation to join in on Christmas festivities.
It would start the day after Thanksgiving, when I’d spend an entire afternoon
cutting inch-wide strips of construction paper to create one ridiculously long,
multi-colored chain used to decorate the walls and ceiling of my tiny little
bedroom. As the years went on and the tradition continued, I’d add little stars
and twinkle lights to the elaborate set-up. A three-dimensional Santa head soon
joined the equation. Finally, the piece de resistance, a foot-high re-creation
of a traditional Christmas tree, complete with grape-sized balls of cherry red.
This treasure would stand atop my TV, where I’d line wrapped goodies for my
family and close friends. I’d work myself silly each year. In early January,
when it came time to take everything down, I was beyond crestfallen. Oh, how I
hated to see it all come to an end.
As evident, Christmas once
brought me such joy and, like all children, was a time of year I’d spend so
many months looking forward to. That all changed shortly after my 18th
birthday, when I got my first job as a cashier at a large department store.
Encountering holiday shoppers quickly became a part of the day I learned to
loathe. With all the griping, groaning, and grappling for sale items, I
discovered just how nasty the holiday season made so many people. Patrons
entered my line positively itching for confrontation and seized the
first opportunity to unload all of their personal frustrations. I’d always
assumed the time of year made everyone as happy as it once made me, but that
first year standing behind a register showed me just how miserable visions of
red and green could make people, and how horribly they often behaved as a
result.
Being on the receiving end
of such animus and vitriol quite literally changed my entire outlook on “the
hap-happiest season of all.” No longer did I look forward to the colder months
and the jingle-jangle of holiday bells. I lost the desire to create my own
little Christmas village, stopped making paper chains. hanging lights, and yes,
I even did away with the mini Christmas tree. December no longer made me smile.
It made me sneer, grimace, and grind my teeth in anticipation of inescapable
chaos. I worked retail for several years after that and my stomach always
tightened with nervous knots when summer came to a close and the smell of
autumn hung in the air, for that smell signaled impending doom.
I’d like to say that since
those horrors are long behind me, my love of “the most wonderful time of the
year” has been restored, but sadly, I cannot. I’m more apathetic than
celebratory and see the 25th as a day not unlike any other. I suppose watching
splatter movies while everyone else is merrily decking the halls is my way at
flipping the bird at all those painted smiles and turning my back on what Silent
Night, Deadly Night’s embittered store clerk accurately describes as “phony
sentiment,” Thank Christ I don’t have kids. No one to act all fake and jolly
for.
I do, however, hope
that you, my B-movie fanatics, are all jollied-up for this latest episode of B-Movie
Bonanza, as it’s centered around my favorite Christmas movie. So pour
yourself a tall glass of egg nog (preferably spiked, as you’ll need a bit of
alcohol to truly understand my breed of wit) and get ready to watch the studly
Robert Brian Wilson hack up some bitches. My source: the Starz / Anchor Bay
Entertainment Blu ray, which runs 1:24:54.
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