ROSEMARY'S BABY (1969)
Starring Mia Farrow, John Cassavettes
Hands down the best horror movie ever made. If it were made today it would shock people as much as it did three decades ago. But it was still a real document of the era it was produced in. A masterpiece and a classic.
Mia Farrow did some excellent psychological prepping for her eventually nightmarish relationship with Woody Allen by starring as Rosemary, wife of Guy (Cassavettes), a New York actor still waiting for his big break. They move into a new apartment complex, where Rosemary suspects their neighbors are Satanists who want her unborn baby for blood rituals.
Incredible dream sequences and
a rising paranoia that starts from the beginning of the film and crescendos at the finale
make this a truly great film. Yes, there's nudity (you'll
see Woody's ex in the buff), a gruesome bloody body on a sidewalk, satanic rituals and
more!
Ironically, director Polanski hired Church of Satan grand priest Anton LaVey to work as an advisor for this film. One of LaVey's ex-followers turned out to be a member of the Manson Family, who ultimately murdered Polanski's young wife, Sharon Tate.
Polanski eventually had to flee the country because he was boinking an underage girl. Farrow really knows how to pick men to associate with. Truth can sometimes be stranger than fiction it seems.
This film's influence is still being felt in splatterdom today. "The Sentinel," "The Devil's Daughter," "The Exorcist," and countless other films borrowed liberally from this one.
