1984. We were in the midst of unprecedented economic prosperity. Ol' Ronnie Reagan was keeping those dirty, filthy Commies at bay. And the mainstream world was being entertained by the likes of The Huxtable Family and, painfully, WHAM! So with money in our pockets and food in our bellies, we decided to turn on our moral radar and scan for things unwholesome in the safe, bland world of middle-class America. During the Christmas season of said year, they found it. Allegedly.
For those who don't know, the movie Silent Night, Deadly Night revolves around a young boy who, after witnessing his parents' brutal murder at the hands of a man clad in a Santa suit on Christmas, grows up tumultuously in a Catholic orphanage and slowly emerges into a spree killer himself.
Apparently, oblivious to Hollywood's previously released Christmas horror fare(Black Christmas, Silent Night, Bloody Night, and the ridiculous Christmas Evil), PTA groups went into an uproar because of the killer Santa.
Which goes to show you their ignorance. If someone broad-minded enough were to have watched this during its initial release(ironically, it came out the same day as the original A Nightmare on Elm Street), they would have seen that the killer witnessed his parents murdered at the hands of a maniac in a Santa suit. Couple with that tragedy is what took place during his Catholic boarding school years. But, like most folks, they didn't see beneath the surface and thus the movie was pulled two weeks after its release.
2 comments:
I agree that Christmas Evil was WAY more shocking and offensive.
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