"I saw the witches kiss the evil one on his behind."

Those of you who have been following this blog for a while already know what a sucker I am for the classics, so this week's Thursday Thriller is an old movie.

It's so old your grandparents won't remember it. Even if they were alive in 1922 when it came out, they still wouldn't remember it because it was banned in the U.S. for being too awesome. 

No, I'm not talking about Nosferatu, I'm talking about Häxan: Witchcraft Through the Ages. 

You might not read much about Häxan in the annals of horror history, because technically, it's a documentary. Danish filmmaker Benjamin Christensen put together this silent collection of dramatized scenes from the Inquisition and boy, do I look cool in it!

The first 15 minutes run a little slow as it sets up historical context, explains some outdated cosmologies, and shows a bunch of medieval artwork. But after the initial slideshow, the movie comes to life. You see a witch at work in her witchery as a lady stops in for a love potion to win the heart of a monk. It works somewhat, but she comes back for a second potion, and then you get the slapstick of seeing a fat, horny monk chasing an old woman around.

It gets really good when the religious elders arrest a crazy old woman named Maria the Weaver and under pain of torture, force her to confess her participation in a black mass. Maria, of course, rats out the women who turned her in, but also confesses to giving birth to my child.

The black mass might be the most fun sequence of the whole movie, as demons cook a baby, women spit and stomp on a crucifix, everyone dances in the woods and all the witches line up to kiss my ass.

A little after that, you get a nifty show-and-tell of the torture devices used to extract confessions, and a discussion about how the whole affair was probably the result of primitive medical practices and folks' inability to diagnose or treat mental illness.

But more about me!

I get to do so much cool stuff, like beckon naked women from their beds, and give holy people a hard way to go. 

And when I get real excited, I churn my own butter.

Häxan streams on Hulu Plus, but if you don't subscribe to that service, you can watch it for free here  or here. Throw it on when you're ready to learn something, or maybe watch it as a bedtime story and give yourself weird dreams.