Rosemary's Baby Review

      As the week of spotlighting two 1960s horror movies wraps up, I picked Roman Polanski’s Rosemary’s Baby to close out the week and transition into the 1970s. I say that because the film deals with the idea of the supernatural in terms of belief. Based on a novel by Ira Levin and Polanski doing the extra effort of writing and directing the film, some consider his adaptation one of the best to translate the book to film. This is the first movie I have seen of Roman Polanski. Just to get it out of the way, I won’t be talking about his personal life since we’ll be judging his work as such. SPOILERS will appear in the review.

1.      Story

The film is about a young couple moving into a new apartment in New York City. Rosemary and Guy Woodhouse played by Mia Farrow and John Cassavetes respectively find the right apartment and adjust. While touring, Rosemary finds a letter from the prior tenant but blows it off. As they adjust, old neighbors come to introduce themselves, I’ll talk about them after this.

Guy is an aspiring actor and somehow got a prestigious part for a play after the first actor went blind. They celebrate with the Castavets and the couple decide to make a baby. Rosemary has a surreal dream and notices that the dream is a nightmare. She wakes up and sees scratches from Guy but ignore it.

The entire film focuses on Rosemary slowly becoming paranoid about her pregnancy. Since she believes that people are trying to kill or harm the baby. I’ll sprinkle in more on the third half in the movie since I feel that it really is the best moments that has the dread.

2.      The Castavets

The Castavets are quite possibly one of the most unassuming but nosey neighbors I have seen in any film. When the Woodhouse’s move in, Mrs. Castavet snoops around the house and noticing that their furniture is expensive. It gets to a point that Rosemary becomes annoyed by them since they keep coming in. When Rosemary get’s pregnant, they give her herbal drinks and feed her desserts which dramatically change her.

I feel that somehow this decade had it where the villains where the unassuming and perfectly normal people. Albeit, the small detail was that something was off about them. Using Norman Bates from Psycho, he came off as socially maladjusted with an odd habit and a mental deterioration. Here though, they come off as very inquisitive and manipulative to the new couple. We’re never shown the scene where Guy made the deal with the devil with the old couple, but it becomes apparent just how much it inadvertently affects Rosemary.

3.      The Degeneration of Rosemary

Throughout the whole movie, Rosemary goes through a transformation when she is pregnant. She starts of with having a pig tail haircut to having a new hairstyle called “Vidal Sassoon”, which her husband and friend Hutch find odd. I feel that it contributes with the subtle manipulation by the Castavets. For instance, there’s a shot where Rosemary is walking in their apartment and as she’s walking, the light bearing down on her face makes her look like a skeleton.

Another instance of where Rosemary is slowly getting paranoid is her having no trust with anyone looking after her. She starts taking herbal drinks from the Castavets which cause her pain in the stomach. More so when her obstetrician Dr. Sapirstein tells her to not read or take pills. It makes her aware that he is in cahoots with the Castavets. I feel that the main horror is the lack of control one has. Especially if a woman being pregnant, where the baby is priority number one. Although, near the end is how I feel is the real horror.  

4.      What We Don’t See

I think the main highlight in the movie is Rosemary seeing the Satanic coven with the baby. Rosemary carries a knife intending to kill them all. Only to be told to look at her baby. She looks at the crib, but we never cut to one shot or a brief look at the baby. We only see her face turned to shocked with horror. It works so well in its execution.

If we even had a look at what the baby was, I think it would have derailed the whole movie. Since either the baby is a perfectly normal or a demonic Cthulu looking one, we are never shown how he looks, and I feel it’s the most underutilized method to making a horror movie. It works because we’re fixed on Rosemary’s horrific expression and everybody else’s satisfaction with how the baby turned out.

The real creepiness is her rocking the baby gently. Since, its her own motherly nature to look after her baby. Knowing that he is the son of the devil. I haven’t read the book and I can only imagine how the author wrote that scene when it happened.

5.      Overall

This is one of the best Polanski film he has made. Additionally, one of the best horror movies from the 60s. While it’s never had moments where there’s an impending doom or anything as such. It has the unnerving dread that something is very wrong and lack of control to really drive the point to feel nervous and sorry for Rosemary. It’s one of the best horror movies to come out of that time and I feel it still holds up now.

Rosemary’s Baby gets a four out of five.