My father recently gifted me a copy of the Chilling Classics 50 Movies Pack, a box set of 50 B-grade and below horror movies, all made sometime between 1949 and 1990. I’ve watched all 50 movies and have written 50 short essays, all between 200 and 500 words—yep, this is one chonky zine! Altogether it clocks in at roughly 16,000 words—for reference, a book is considered a novel at 40,000. Recently boosted to half size to accommodate all of the writing, A Satanic Butchery of Boredom has been a dream project, each essay not just a movie review, but finds me diving deep into my own psyche, relating old stories, new theories, and deep, dark secrets. I don’t mean to toot my own horn, but this is a really rad zine!

Here’s a sneak peek of the kind of writing you’ll get to enjoy if you pick up the zine:

1. The Murder Mansion (1972)

“Wow, I love this movie already,” he said within a minute of starting it. The cool guy in the muscle car, the dork on the motorbike with his goggles, the jazzy race scene. The fireplace movie titles were enough of a flex, but it took almost five full minutes of the movie before I even knew if it was in English or not. A part of me wondered if it was going to be some kind of nouveau-70s-era-silent-film. I love watching European movies, particularly those from the late 60s to early 80s: everyone in Europe dresses so beautifully in movies. Like, actually beautifully. American movie culture is all face and product placement. I want to live in the lush colors of Europe in the 70s: the deep turquoise wallpapers, the velvety brown corduroy jackets, the bleached salmon button downs. The rich haziness of the old grain film, the warmth of the proto-synth soundtrack. All this in just the first twenty minutes! Italian horror has an amazing quality: the verdant colors, the beautiful actors, all punctuated by levels of intense gore and violence that’s almost unmatched by other horror of its time. I’m not a big fan of ultra-violence, but luckily The Murder Mansion is old enough to seem a little silly, and there’s so much more to recommend it. There’s something so wonderful about the melodrama of The Murder Mansion, too: the long stares, the constant zooming in of the camera, the definitive statements. There’s a wonderful kind of kitschiness, like they’ve added a dash of Mommie Dearest. While this movie drags at times, I can feel like that might actually be a failing of mine. Is it too difficult for me to watch a movie from start to finish these days? Is it too difficult for me to concentrate on anything for longer than ten minutes now? It can sure feel like it. Anyway, this is a beautiful movie to live inside for awhile, but there does come a point when it begins to drag, and I found myself checking my proverbial watch to see how much longer it had. Oh well. This was an excellent start to my project, and today couldn’t have been cozier: it’s cold and snowing outside, and watching the fireplace rage and the deep, dark corridors of the mansion are making me feel sleepy and wonderful.