See also:

Apocalypse

By Billy Anderson

It's really amusing to look over the ads for drive-in movies at Christmas time. During the season when Christians celebrate the birth of Christ, what kind of films were being shown at the drive-ins?

Very often, sex movies and ghastly horror movies. One Christmas day the Sunset Drive-In opened with Blood Feast and Naked Witch.

I've seen both these film and don't think they did anything to celebrate Christmas. Blood Feast was about human sacrifice to the Pagan Goddess Ishtar, and Naked Witch opened with paintings of Pagan ceremonies, including sexual orgies and cannibalism.

Many Christians would say the showing of such films at Christmas time is not "appropriate."

But after giving it some thought, I'm not sure. Everyone acknowledges that the Pagan peoples had a December celebration, honoring their Gods, and that after they converted to Christianity, they still wanted to continue celebrating. So, they claimed the December celebration was honoring the birth of Christ.

And despite the ancient conversions, Christians viewed "the world", as a whole, as still being Pagan and still in need of conversion to Christianity. So the people going to the drive-in movies and seeing films about sacrifices to the Pagan Gods are just carrying on the old Pagan traditions, very "appropriate" for a December celebration, from a Pagan point of view.

I remember one of my own Pagan Christmases. I didn't do anything to celebrate the birth of Christ. I woke up before dawn, drank some strawberry wine, then a few Pabst Blue Ribbon beers. Feeling pretty good, I read a Dick Tracy comic book, then got the morning newspaper out of the box, with plans to go back to sleep.

Well, what was playing at the drive-in movie this Pagan Christmas? The Alice Drive-In had four horror movies! Circus Of Horror, Black Sunday, Tales Of Terror and Blood Bath.

Usually the drive-ins would include a "Merry Christmas" or "Seasons Greetings" in their ad for horror films and sex films at Christmas. It always seemed ironic to me, recognizing Christmas in ads for such Pagan films.

One year, the Sunset Drive-In didn't have any mention of Christmas in any of their ads during the Christmas season. They just opened with Sex And The Single Sailor and Orgy At Lil's Place on Christmas Day Sunday, with no Christmas greeting at all in their ad.

Why don't all of us drive-in movie fans get a special collection of ads for horror and sex movies shown at Christmas? I've sure had a great time doing it myself. We could probably come up with hundreds of ads.

Well, that's enough for now. It's time to END IT!