Wednesday, October 20, 2004

The Goat of Mendes! The Devil Himself!


Mmm, curious ...
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Quite a while ago now I wrote a brief page on Satanic corporate logos than was 98.5% sceptical; hidden 13's and 666's in McDonalds, Microsoft and Disney logos and the Euro Coin, that sort of thing.
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I blew it all off whilst still being quite amused by a couple of the stories.
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However, a couple of recent UK advertising campaigns have resulted in a large number of peculiar posters being slapped-up all around London. These posters are peculiar because they feature a certain gesture, presented in the guise of being something to do with telephones.
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Fans of Dennis Wheatley novels and former members of the Bristol University Druidsoc know this gesture well, as the greeting made when fans of the Horn-ed Beast happen upon each other. Sadly, Dennis Wheatley died as a result of excessive port and stilton consumption in 1977 but the gesture is still popular with acolytes of the Naughty One and, erm, George Bush ...
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My occult logos page, revised in the light of the apparent imminent return of the Horned Beast, is here:
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A website devoted to the life and works of Dennis Wheatley can be found here:
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Even though he was massively, massively popular in the 1960's and 70's and sold millions, his books are quite hard to come by these days. Largely because he was breathtakingly posh, believed implicitly in the superiority of the Anglo Saxon race, praised Mussolini, enjoyed writing about misogynistic sadism and was quite certain that all socialists worshipped Lucifer. He was definitely his own man.
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Even as a 12 year old, reading a copy of To the Devil a Daughter, I can recall thinking that a story centered on Satanistic Communists plotting to drain the sexual potency of the Free World by breeding legions of succubi she-demons in glass jars was just a teensy weensy bit deranged.
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Several of his books were turned into Hammer Horror films (with slightly less emphasis on the fascist misogyny side of things), including the awesomely tacky masterwork 'The Devil Rides Out'. A story of dim, but plucky, English Upper Class types battling with the disciples of Beelzebub in a series of country houses; featuring several of the finest lines ever uttered in a British Horror film, including ...
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'It is The Goat of Mendes! The Devil Himself!'
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I guess you'd actually have to see the film to understand the genius of this line and the special effects that went with it. On any rational level this is an atrocious movie, yet it is still somehow strangely compelling. I defy anyone not to burst into incontrollable laughter during the final, climactic scene where the Angel of Death himself rides onto the screen and a five second loop of film is repeatedly rewound and played jerkily backwards and forwards, okey kokey style. If the Dark Horseman really looks as laughable as that, none of us need fear meeting him; unless he pretends to be a friend of yours on a socially critical occasion.
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Dennis' works definitely deserve a come-back, purely on the basis of spoof material alone without any need for reworking at all, and this is one of the many projects I will undertake once I become independently wealthy.
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Of course, if any random readers of this blog have any practical suggestions as to how I can become independently wealthy and devote some time to the promotion of the works of Dennis Wheatley and other noble projects, please do not hesitate to contact me. Don't hesitate at all.

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