Ah, another film by rapist Roman
Polanski. To all those that defend him and want him to keep making
movies, there are plenty of prisons that allow prisoners to study
broadcasting and other related trades. I’m sure those programs
could be adapted to help him continue making movies from his rightful
place under lock and key. Think about it! A prison film, made in
prison, by prisoners, and directed by Roman Polanski... who is
himself one of the prisoners!
Anyway, to deal with the actual subject
of the movie, Mia Farrow plays Rosemary, a young woman who moves into
a nice apartment with her struggling actor husband (John Cassavetes)
who has suddenly started receiving movie offers. Rosemary has a
“dream” in which all of her neighbors and her husband take part
in a Satanic ritual in which the Devil rapes her... and a short time
later she finds out that she’s pregnant.
The movie has some obvious similarities
to Polanski’s The Tenant, and together with his film
Repulsion they are considered a loose trilogy. As I have not
yet seen Repulsion though, I must limit myself to commentary
on the other two. Both films deal with a person living in an urban
setting who fears that their neighbors are attempting to manipulate
them for some sinister purpose. The key difference here is that
Rosemary’s fear is eventually resolved, whereas we never find out
if Trelkovsky was insane or not. I could say I prefer that latter,
but I’m not sure this story would have worked without a final
reveal.
The fact that the baby is the
anti-Christ is so well known at this point that I’m a little
uncertain how I use that in interpreting the movie. Rosemary clearly
believes that the baby is intended to be a sacrifice, but I’m not
entirely sure Polanski intended for us to buy that. If he did, he
likely would have been more ambiguous in showing who raped Rosemary.
Instead he makes it clear that the Devil did the deed personally. So
then, my interpretation is that Rosemary is simply too confused to
clearly remember or understand what happened, causing her to come to
the wrong conclusion, while we as the audience have already been
clued in.
I’d also like to think that most
viewers would see the movie itself as somewhat paranoid in light of
the Satanic Panic in the 80’s, in which fear of Satanists abusing
and sacrificing children led to numerous innocent people being
jailed. Unfortunately, recent movies like Annabelle show that
a disturbing number of people are still willing to pay to be told
that a secret group of Satanists are somehow a threat to our very
civilization.
Putting those issues aside however, the
fear presented in this movie still feels very real. Rosemary is a
housewife with her husband in complete control of her life. He
decides where she lives, he decides who she socializes with and he
controls what doctor she sees. He’s able to cut her off from
outside influences, and if he wants to sell her womb to the Devil to
get better acting gigs, then he’s going to do exactly that.
Rosemary’s position is not helped by
the fact that anyone not in the cult generally assumes her to be
hallucinating. At one point, she does run away and goes to her
former doctor (Charles Grodin). I imagine today a doctor who had a
pregnant woman come to him with a mortal fear of her husband would
have a reaction other than calling the husband to come get her and
threatening to send her to a mental hospital if she didn’t stop
talking about witches.
The ending of the movie, while
revealing the Satanic cult to be real, remains fairly ambiguous. The
cult tries to convince Rosemary that her baby died while keeping her
drugged, and taking her milk which they claim to “throw away.”
However, Rosemary is able to make a final escape, discover the coven…
and join them. Naturally, they’re more than happy to have the
Anti-Christ’s mother helping them to raise him of her own free
will. However, to the audience, Rosemary’s motivation remains
unclear. It’s uncertain if she has legitimately been converted, if
she simply wants more freedom or if she wants to raise her baby and
doesn’t care about the circumstances. In the novel, her hope was
to raise the baby to reject his father, but there’s no clear
indication of this in the film.
Despite my utter hatred of Polanski the
human being, I can only recommend this film. Yes, it’s dated, but
still relatable. The atmosphere is creepy and the performances are
all good. The decision to make all the Satanists seem like
completely ordinary people from different walks of life benefits the
film immensely, as it adds to the paranoia while also giving a sense
of realism. Mia Farrow could have given more than one Hollywood
leading lady lessons in how to play a distressed woman without
seeming helpless or incompetent. In conclusion, this is just a
really well-made film.
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