Rosemary's Baby (film)

Rosemary's Baby

Theatrical release poster
Directed by Roman Polanski
Produced by William Castle
Written by Roman Polanski
Novel:
Ira Levin
Starring Mia Farrow
John Cassavetes
Ruth Gordon
Sidney Blackmer
Maurice Evans
Ralph Bellamy
Music by Krzysztof Komeda
Cinematography William A. Fraker
Editing by Sam O'Steen
Bob Wyman
Distributed by Paramount Pictures
Release date(s) June 12, 1968
Running time 136 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $2.3 million
Gross revenue $33,395,426
Followed by Look What's Happened to Rosemary's Baby

Rosemary's Baby is a 1968 American horror film written and directed by Roman Polanski, based on the bestselling 1967 novel of the same name by Ira Levin. The film received mostly positive reviews and earned numerous nominations and awards. The film has led to numerous references in film, television, music and other media. The American Film Institute ranked the film 9th in their 100 Years…100 Thrills list. The official tagline of the film is "Pray for Rosemary's Baby."

Contents

Plot summary

Rosemary Woodhouse (Mia Farrow), a bright but somewhat naive young housewife, and Guy (John Cassavetes), her husband and a struggling actor, move into the Bramford, a New York City apartment building with a history of unsavory tenants and mysterious events. Their neighbors are an elderly and slightly eccentric couple, Minnie and Roman Castevet (Ruth Gordon and Sidney Blackmer), who tend to be meddlesome but seem harmless. Guy becomes unusually close to the pair while Rosemary tries to maintain a distance from them. Guy lands a role in a play when the actor originally cast suddenly and inexplicably goes blind. Soon afterward, Guy suggests that he and Rosemary have the child they had planned. On the night they plan to try to conceive, Minnie brings them individual ramekins of chocolate mousse, but Rosemary finds hers has a chalky under-taste and surreptitiously throws it away after a few mouthfuls. Shortly afterward, she has a dizzy spell and passes out. She experiences what she perceives to be a strange dream in which she is raped by a demonic presence.

A few weeks later, Rosemary learns she is pregnant and is due on June 28, 1966 (6/66). She plans to receive obstetric care from Dr. Hill, recommended by her friend Elise (Emmaline Henry), but the Castevets insist she see their good friend, famed obstetrician, Dr. Sapirstein (Ralph Bellamy). For the first three months of her pregnancy, Rosemary suffers severe abdominal pains, loses weight, and craves raw meat and chicken liver. The doctor insists the pain will subside soon and assures her she has nothing to worry about. At the Castavets' New Year's Eve party, Roman raises a toast to "1966: the Year One".

When her old friend Hutch sees Rosemary's gaunt appearance, he is disturbed enough to do some research, and plans to share his findings with her but falls into a coma before they can meet. He briefly regains consciousness before he dies, and instructs his friend Grace Cardiff to deliver the book about witchcraft on his desk that he had planned to give to Rosemary. Photographs, passages in the text he marked, and the cryptic message "the name is an anagram" lead Rosemary to realize Roman Castevet is really Steven Marcato, the son of Adrian Marcato, a former resident of the Bramford who was accused of worshiping Satan and was a martyr to the cause. She suspects her neighbors are part of a cult with sinister designs for her baby, and Guy is cooperating with them in exchange for their help in advancing his career. She deduces that Dr. Saperstein is also part of the conspiracy when his receptionist comments that the smell coming from a good luck charm given to Rosemary by the Castavets — which contains tannis root, also known as "Devil's Pepper" — reminds her of a fragrance often shared by the doctor.

An increasingly disturbed Rosemary shares her fears and suspicions with Dr. Hill, who, assuming she is delusional, calls Dr. Sapirstein and Guy. She is told that if she cooperates, she and the baby will not be harmed. The two men bring Rosemary home, at which point she goes into labor. When she awakens following the delivery of her baby, she is told the child died shortly after birth. However, when she hears an infant's cries somewhere in the building, she suspects he still is alive. In the hall closet, she discovers a secret door leading into the Castevet apartment where the coven meets, and finds the congregation gathered, worshipping her newborn son, the spawn of Satan. The truth is revealed about Rosemary's son being the Antichrist, devastating Rosemary considerably. Both Roman and the coven urge Rosemary to become a mother to her son, Adrian. The film ends with her adjusting her son's blankets and gently rocking his cradle.

Cast

Production

Script

In Rosemary's Baby: A Retrospective, a featurette on the DVD release of the film, screenwriter/director Roman Polanski, Paramount Pictures executive Robert Evans, and production designer Richard Sylbert reminisce at length about the production. Evans recalled William Castle brought him the galley proofs of the book and asked him to purchase the film rights even before Random House released the publication. The studio head recognized the commercial potential of the project and agreed with the stipulation that Castle, who had a reputation for low-budget horror films, could produce but not direct the film adaptation. He makes a cameo as the man at the phone booth waiting for Mia Farrow to finish her call.

Evans admired Polanski's European films and hoped he could convince him to make his American debut with Rosemary's Baby. He knew the director was a ski buff who was anxious to make a film with the sport as its basis, so he sent him the script for Downhill Racer along with the galleys for Rosemary. Polanski read the latter book non-stop through the night and called Evans the following morning to tell him he thought Rosemary was the more interesting project, and would like the opportunity to write as well as direct it.

Polanski, having never before adapted a screenplay, was not aware that he was allowed to make changes from the source material, leading to the film being extremely faithful to the novel and including many lines of dialogue drawn directly from Levin's book. Author Ira Levin claimed that during a scene in which Guy mentions wanting to buy a particular shirt advertised in The New Yorker, Polanski was unable to find the specific issue with the shirt advertised and phoned Levin for help. Levin, who had assumed while writing that any given issue of The New Yorker would contain an ad for men's shirts, admitted that he had made it up.[1]

Casting

Polanski envisioned Rosemary as a robust, full-figured, girl-next-door type, and he wanted Tuesday Weld or his own wife Sharon Tate for the role. Since the book had not reached bestseller status yet, Evans was unsure the title alone would guarantee an audience for the film, and he felt a bigger name was needed for the lead. Patty Duke was considered for the lead. With only a supporting role in Guns at Batasi (1964) and the not-yet-released A Dandy in Aspic (1968) as her only feature film credits, Mia Farrow had an unproven box office track record, but her role as Allison MacKenzie in the popular television series Peyton Place and her unexpected marriage to Frank Sinatra had made her a household name. Despite her waif-like appearance (which would ultimately prove beneficial to the character, as Rosemary became more frail as her pregnancy progressed), Polanski agreed to cast her. Her acceptance incensed Sinatra, who had demanded she forgo her career when they wed, and he served her divorce papers via a corporate lawyer, in front of the cast and crew midway through filming. In an effort to salvage her relationship, Farrow asked Evans to release her from her contract, but he persuaded her to remain with the project after showing her an hour-long rough cut and assuring her she would receive an Academy Award nomination for her performance.

Robert Redford was the first choice for the role of Guy Woodhouse, but he turned down the offer. Jack Nicholson was considered briefly before Polanski suggested John Cassavetes.

Sylbert was a good friend of Garson Kanin, who was married to Ruth Gordon, and he suggested her for the role of Minnie Castevet. He also suggested The Dakota, an Upper West Side apartment building known for its show business tenants, be used for the Bramford. Its hallways were not as worn and dark as Polanski wanted, but when the building's owners would not allow interior filming, that became a moot point and it was used for exterior shots only.

Polanski wanted to cast Hollywood old-timers as the coven members but did not know any by name. He drew sketches of how he envisioned each character, and they were used to fill the roles. In every instance, the actor cast strongly resembled Polanski's drawing. These included Ralph Bellamy, Patsy Kelly, Elisha Cook, Jr., Phil Leeds, and Hope Summers.

When Rosemary calls Donald Baumgart, the actor who goes blind and is replaced by Guy, the voice heard is that of actor Tony Curtis. Farrow, who had not been told who would be reading Baumgart's lines, recognized the voice but could not place it. The slight confusion she displays throughout the call was exactly what Polanski hoped to capture by not revealing Curtis' identity in advance.

Filming

Sydney Guilaroff designed the wig worn by Mia Farrow in the film's early scenes. It was removed to reveal the Vidal Sassoon hairdo that made headlines when Farrow cut her trademark long hair during filming of Peyton Place.

One of Mia Farrow's more emotionally charged scenes occurs in the midst of a party, when several of Rosemary's female friends lock Guy out of the kitchen as they console her in private. The scene was shot in a single day. That morning, just before the first take was filmed, a private messenger served Farrow with formal divorce papers from Frank Sinatra. As she read the documents, Farrow fell to her knees on the kitchen floor and openly wept in front of the cast and crew. Roman Polanski insisted that the day be canceled and filming be postponed until the next day, when he would start consecutively filming as many scenes as possible that did not contain Rosemary. Farrow openly would not accept this, insisting that nothing had changed. The day's filming concluded on time and without delay.

When Farrow was reluctant to film a scene that depicted a dazed and preoccupied Rosemary wandering into the middle of a Manhattan street into oncoming traffic, Polanski pointed to her pregnancy padding and reassured her, "no one's going to hit a pregnant woman". The scene was successfully shot with Farrow walking into real traffic and Polanski following along, operating the hand-held camera since he was the only one willing to do it.[2]

Critical reception

Rosemary's Baby has a 98% "Certified Fresh" rating on the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, with 46 of the 47 reviews being positive.[3] In her review for The New York Times, Renata Adler said, "The movie—although it is pleasant—doesn't seem to work on any of its dark or powerful terms. I think this is because it is almost too extremely plausible. The quality of the young people's lives seems the quality of lives that one knows, even to the point of finding old people next door to avoid and lean on. One gets very annoyed that they don't catch on sooner."[4]

Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times called it "a brooding, macabre film, filled with the sense of unthinkable danger. Strangely enough it also has an eerie sense of humor almost until the end. It is a creepy film and a crawly film, and a film filled with things that go bump in the night. It is very good...much more than just a suspense story; the brilliance of the film comes more from Polanski's direction, and from a series of genuinely inspired performances, than from the original story . . . The best thing that can be said about the film, I think, is that it works. Polanski has taken a most difficult situation and made it believable, right up to the end. In this sense, he even outdoes Hitchcock."[5]

Variety stated, "Several exhilarating milestones are achieved in Rosemary's Baby, an excellent film version of Ira Levin's diabolical chiller novel. Writer-director Roman Polanski has triumphed in his first US-made pic. The film holds attention without explicit violence or gore . . . Farrow's performance is outstanding."[6]

Legacy

In the 1976 television film, Look What's Happened to Rosemary's Baby, Patty Duke starred as Rosemary Woodhouse and Ruth Gordon reprised her role of Minnie Castevet.

For the scene where Rosemary is raped by Satan, Rosemary's Baby ranked #23 on Bravo's 100 Scariest Movie Moments. Contrary to an urban legend, Anton LaVey did not play the role of Satan in the rape scene of Rosemary's Baby. In fact it was actor Clay Tanner, and no technical advisor was used.[7][8]

Thirty years after he wrote Rosemary's Baby, Ira Levin wrote Son of Rosemary, a sequel which he dedicated to the film's star, Mia Farrow. Reaction to the book was mixed, but it made the best seller lists nationwide.

A 2009-2010 remake of Rosemary's Baby was briefly considered. The intended producers were Michael Bay, Andrew Form, and Brad Fuller.[9][10] The remake fell through in 2008.[11] Les Deux Love Orchestra included their version of "Lullabye From Rosemary's Baby" on their 2009 album, "Ecstasy." It features a vocal by Kendal Brenneman.

Awards and honors

Academy Awards
Golden Globe Awards
Other awards

In popular culture

The film has been parodied in numerous works since its 1968 release, including Mad Magazine ("Rosemia's Boo-Boo", issue #124, January 1969) and The Realist ("Rosemerica's Baby", No. 93, August 1972[12]).

References to the film can also be found in innumerable music and television works. Some artists who have featured references to the film within their music include Interpol, The Devil Wears Prada, The Tubes, Today Is the Day, Walt Mink and Fantômas. The Hardcore punk band Rosemary's Babies took the pluralized version of the title as a statement of their horror film influences. The film has also been referenced in several television shows and other films, including That 70s Show, Bébé's Kids, South Park, Star Trek: Enterprise, Chapter 27, Stay Tuned, Ugly Americans, Frasier, Weeds, Angels in America, CSI, Gilmore Girls and Roseanne.

Notes

  1. ↑ http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0063522/trivia
  2. ↑ http://www.tcm.com/thismonth/article/?cid=89031&rss=mrqe
  3. ↑ "Rosemary's Baby (1968)". Rotten Tomatoes. http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/rosemarys_baby/. Retrieved 2008-05-29. 
  4. ↑ New York Times review
  5. ↑ Chicago Sun-Times review
  6. ↑ Variety review
  7. ↑ "Imdb Entry Clay Tanner"
  8. ↑ "The Church of Satan by Micheal Aquino p. 17"
  9. ↑ Bay preps 'Rosemary' redo, Hollywood Reporter
  10. ↑ "Rosemary's Baby Remake Confirmed". cinemablend.com. http://www.cinemablend.com/new/Rosemary-s-Baby-Remake-Confirmed-8144.html. Retrieved May 21, 2010. 
  11. ↑ [1]
  12. ↑ http://www.ep.tc/realist/93/23.html

External links

Films directed by Roman Polanski
Feature
films
Knife in the Water (1962) · Repulsion (1965) · Cul-de-Sac (1966) · The Fearless Vampire Killers (1967) · Rosemary's Baby (1968) · Macbeth (1971) · What? (1973) · Chinatown (1974) · The Tenant (1976) · Tess (1979) · Pirates (1986) · Frantic (1988) · Bitter Moon (1992) · Death and the Maiden (1994) · The Ninth Gate (1999) · The Pianist (2002) · Oliver Twist (2005) · The Ghost Writer (2010)
Short
films
Rower (1955) · Uśmiech zębiczny (1957) · Rozbijemy zabawę (1957) · Morderstwo (1957) · Dwaj ludzie z szafą (1958) · Lampa (1959) · Gdy spadają anioly (1959) · Le Gros et le maigre (1961) · Ssaki (1962) · La rivière de diamants (1964) · Cinema Erotique (2007)