Rosemary's Baby (1968)

A young couple move into a new apartment, only to be surrounded by peculiar neighbors and occurrences. When the wife becomes mysteriously pregnant, paranoia over the safety of her unborn child begins controlling her life.

Director:

Roman Polanski

Writers:

Ira Levin (novel), Roman Polanski (screenplay)

Stars:

Mia Farrow, John Cassavetes, Ruth Gordon

Top 250 #237 | Won 1 Oscar. Another 11 wins & 9 nominations.

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Mia Farrow	...	Rosemary Woodhouse
John Cassavetes	...	Guy Woodhouse
Ruth Gordon	...	Minnie Castevet
Sidney Blackmer	...	Roman Castevet
Maurice Evans	...	Hutch
Ralph Bellamy	...	Dr. Sapirstein
Victoria Vetri	...	Terry (as Angela Dorian)
Patsy Kelly	...	Laura-Louise
Elisha Cook Jr.	...	Mr. Nicklas (as Elisha Cook)
Emmaline Henry	...	Elise Dunstan
Charles Grodin	...	Dr. Hill
Hanna Landy	...	Grace Cardiff
Phil Leeds	...	Dr. Shand (as Philip Leeds)
D'Urville Martin	...	Diego
Hope Summers	...	Mrs. Gilmore

Storyline

Rosemary and Guy Woodhouse move into an apartment in a building with a bad reputation. They discover that their neighbours are a very friendly elderly couple named Roman and Minnie Castevet, and Guy begins to spend a lot of time with them. Strange things start to happen: a woman Rosemary meets in the laundry dies a mysterious death, Rosemary has strange dreams and hears strange noises and Guy becomes remote and distant. Then Rosemary falls pregnant and begins to suspect that her neighbours have special plans for her child.

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Plot Keywords:

apartment | neighbor | dream | pregnancy | baby | 

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Taglines:

Pray for Rosemary's Baby

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Genres:

Drama | Horror | Mystery

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Certificate:

Approved

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

12 June 1968 (USA)

Also Known As:

El bebé de Rosemary

Filming Locations:

Dakota Hotel - 1 West 72nd St. at Central Park West, Manhattan, New York City, New York, USA

Box Office

Budget:

$2,300,000 (estimated)

Company Credits

Production Co:

William Castle Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

136 min

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

This film, along with Repulsion and The Tenant, forms a loose trilogy by Roman Polanski about the horrors of apartment/city dwelling.

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Goofs

When Rosemary is waiting to see Dr. Saperstein in the waiting room (right before she walks out in a rush), she is wearing red lipstick. Moments later, she walks to the phone booth and she is wearing light pink lipstick.

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Quotes

Rosemary Woodhouse: Oh, God. Oh, God.
Laura-Louise McBirney: Oh, shut up with your "Oh, Gods" or we'll kill you, milk or no milk!

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Connections

Referenced in Absolutely Fabulous: France (1992)

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Soundtracks

"Lullaby"
(uncredited)
Composed by Krzysztof Komeda
Sung by Mia Farrow

User Reviews

Reassuring to fine it's every bit as good as its staunchest champions would have you believe

Why aren't the horror directors of today as careful with their scripts as Polanski was? Not that this is really horror. Horror as we know it came into being with the slasher flicks of the late 1970s and early 1980s; "Rosemary's Baby" is rather the kind of thing that the term "dark fantasy" was coined to describe, by people of taste who noticed that the word "horror" promised audiences something distinctly unpleasant and nasty.

The film's construction is marvellous. Things start slow - one beat, so to speak, to a bar - and gradually pick up speed so that by the end we are nervously tapping out semiquavers with our feet. Polanski also understands the gentle art of hint-dropping. Many events are filed away as tiny puzzles to be solved later, and they ARE solved later; others we don't attach any particular significance to at the time Polanski invites us to re-interpret in retrospect, AND chooses the right moment to let us do so. And then, at the end, AFTER we've worked everything out, he presents us with a surprise - a delightful, gratuitous twist which nothing had prepared us for, which we couldn't have guessed, yet which doesn't cancel out the story as we'd understood it. (Alas, many people know what this surprise is in advance. I, for one. Yet this foreknowledge did nothing to spoil my enjoyment: a sure sign of superb construction.)

All in all, a film that tempts you to rank it with the best ever made - which is more, but not much more, than it deserves - simply because it's perfect. Everything went right. Rosemary is a wonderfully sympathetic heroine, powerless without being passive, largely ignorant of what's going on around her without being at all stupid, and Mia Farrow makes you care deeply about her. The cinematography is pellucid; the art direction is subtly right; there's also a fine, odd yet tuneful, musical score. I can't believe I waited so long to see this.