“Forget the parade:
WHAT COULD BE SCARIER ON HALLOWEEN?!”
– Time Out New York

“Just in time for Halloween! Get your fix of the iconic thriller!”
– New York Magazine

(1968) Despite their fab new Upper West Side apartment in the venerable Dakota (doubling for the infamously storied “Bramford”), complete with eerily avuncular neighbors Sidney Blackmer and Ruth Gordon (the latter in an Oscar-winning performance by turns hilarious and chilling), nice kid Mia Farrow’s career-obsessed actor husband John Cassavetes is still looking for that big break. But then a Broadway lead looms when the star mysteriously goes blind, and Farrow gets in the family way after an evening of wild love-making — but wait...was that hubby, or some sort of horned beast? Suddenly every harried mom-to-be’s nightmare seems true, with Farrow getting no help even from her obstetricians, 30s fifth-wheel legend Ralph Bellamy (here beardedly creepy) and weasly Charles Grodin. Horror-gimmick-meister William Castle (The Tingler, Homicidal, Macabre) took his one shot at bigtime producing when he bought Ira Levin’s bestseller, then only got to kibbitz when Paramount studio chief Robert (The Kid Stays in the Picture) Evans handed the directorial reins to Polish wunderkind Roman Polanski, who brought his penchant for no-exit situations and crumbling sanity amid banal settings (Knife in the Water, Cul-de-Sac, Repulsion) to mainstream, big-budget horror. Revitalizing and legitimizing a once-B-grade genre, Rosemary paved the way for future blockbusters like The Exorcist, Jaws and Alien. “Supremely intelligent and convincing... Sexual politics, urban alienation, and a deeply pessimistic view of human interaction permeate the film, directed with a slow, careful build-up of pace and a precise sense of visual composition. Although it manages to be frightening, there is little gore or explicit violence; instead, what disturbs is the blurring of reality and nightmare, and the way Farrow is slowly transformed from a healthy, happily-married wife to a haunted, desperately confused shadow of her former self. Great performances, too, and a marvellously melancholy score by Krzysztof Komeda.” – Geoff Andrews, Time Out (London). “Pregnant women should see it at their own risk.” – Motion Picture Herald. Approx. 136 min.
A PARAMOUNT PICTURES RELEASE.

Click here to read Karen Durbin's column on ROSEMARY'S BABY from The New York Times
[January 19, 2003]

Click here to listen to WNYC's Nathan Lee and Time Out NY's Melissa Anderson discuss Rosemary's Baby