Rosemary’s Baby is our final entry in the horror anniversary series. At one point, it was meant to kick the series off. Yet, I easily get distracted and we’re now more than a week past Halloween. What is there to say about this film? It’s always fun to make pregnant women watch it. It might be Polanski’s most competent American movie. Chinatown was the better written, but Rosemary’s Baby was the better shot. Fight me on this, movie nerds.
Roman Polanski worked with William Castle on this one. Not directly, as Castle had the most bullshit of bullshit producer credits on this one. The schlockmeister bought the rights to the source novel and squatted over them. So, Robert Evans crawled out of a pile of loose women to confront Castle about playing ball. Thus, Castle ends up producing a Polanski movie. Charles Grodin is also in this movie if you want ever more minutia.
Here’s one more bit of trivia. When Polanski was shooting the handheld and intimate moments, he had Mia Farrow attend a Broadway performance. Joan Crawford shot a scene that was meant to be in the movie, but it got cut from the final print. Finding quality stills of that scene is hard to find, but if anyone can find them…let me know. Anyways, the movie runs over 2 hours and doesn’t feel like it.
The entire film builds to the classic reveal, but you never get a sense of classic pacing. Polanski and Farrow manage to fully place the audience in Rosemary’s perspective. You stumble from scene-to-scene, as everyone else plans around you. Plus, it made old people creepy again. In one scene they’re naked and in the other they’re hailing Satan. 1968 audiences must’ve been guffawing at such theatrics.
When you consider that this is a film about a young blonde being talked by a cult, then creepy history comes into play. Less than a year after this film’s release, the Manson family would murder Sharon Tate and her unborn baby. Due to the sheer gruesome nature of the crime, people didn’t pick up on the weird coincidence for a bit. Looking at it from the present, I can’t see how it wasn’t the only thing being brought up.
It’s time for a Rosemary’s Baby contest!
I could go on and on about how much I love the movie, but I want you to share in the joy. This is until supply runs out, but I have two Vudu codes to give away to watch the Paramount Digital version of this film. The HD transfer is comparable to the Criterion Blu-ray, but I think this transfer looks sharper. Oh well, win the contest and you can argue with me. Enter by hitting up AndersonVision on any of the socials. You can comment below. Basically, you have to get my attention.
Rosemary’s Baby turned 50 on October 17th.
