Rosemarys Baby Digital

Poor remake of a classic. The lead actress playing Rosemary was horrible. This movie was very disappointing.

So says the female protagonist. Terrible letdown vs. the 1968 original. Reinforces the cliche that remakes are not a good idea. Nice Paris locales cannot save movie from trite plot and screenplay not well adapted to the novel. The scariest scene is of the apartment handyman scrabbling down a hallway on all fours like a dog.

There’s two ways you can react to a new version of “Rosemary’s Baby.” The first one is to completely write it off and make the assumption that no one could do a better job of adapting Ira Levin’s bestseller than Roma Polanski did in 1968. The other reaction is to take it as a new vision of the book that isn’t trying to be a remake of the first movie and enjoy or hate it for what it is according to its own merits. I think the one thing we can all agree on is that if the Satanic Panic-type films of the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s are going to be introduced to a whole new generation of viewers, there’s no better place to start than with “Rosemary’s Baby.” After all, it really is where the trend began for mainstream moviegoers. Young Rosemary Woodhouse (Zoe Saldana) and her husband (Patrick J. Adams) move to Paris after he is offered a job there. After a residential fire, the couple are invited to live in a luxurious apartment by landlord’s Roman (Jason Isaacs) and Margaux Castevet (Carole Bouquet). Rosemary becomes pregnant and her eccentric neighbors shower her with kindness and devotion. She begins to suspect they’re only after one thing following an investigation into the building’s mysterious ties to the occult. Rosemary believes the supportive bunch are a coven of witches looking to sacrifice her baby to stay young. There’s no doubt in my mind that everyone involved in the new version of “Rosemary’s Baby” was dedicated to the project. Zoe Saldana completely embraces her role as the damaged-yet-hopeful Rosemary, who desperately wants to do the right thing for her unborn child. Jason Isaacs and Carole Bouquet are deliciously wicked playing the reserved but extremely persuasive Castevets. “Rosemary’s Baby” is not rated. However, I would give it a PG-13 rating for adult situations, sensuality, and disturbing images. There’s a bit of gore and some sex scenes without nudity. There’s no heavy religious message to be found within “Rosemary’s Baby.” If it teaches you anything, it’s that you need to be careful what you’re willing to sacrifice for material success and temporary happiness. Although it deals with Satan and his powers, it’s not evangelical in any form and doesn’t preach at the viewer in regards to their spiritual life. The DVD version of Rosemarys Baby contains some limited bonus material. Two featurettes explore behind the scenes of the movie in Fear is Born: The Making of Rosemarys Baby and Grand Guignol: Parisian Production Design. The cast and crew are interviewed about their roles in the film and expand on filming in the most romantic city on Earth. People who have never seen Roman Polanski’s “Rosemary’s Baby” and haven’t read anything about it will no doubt enjoy this updated version more than those already exposed to the classic tale. I found it to be entertaining and thrilling at times. Was it as good as Polanski’s 1968 version? I wouldn’t say so. Did it seem to dig a little deeper and expand on the concept more than the original? Yes, considering it was a two-part movie and had around 34 minutes more to flesh things out.

ROSEMARYS BABY - the original 1968 film version directed by Roman Polanski - was smart, stylish, sardonic, sensational and superb - all the things, indeed, that this needless remake is not. This allegedly modern retelling is, in fact, what it actually is: and that is a TV movie fatiguingly drawn out to accommodate its every-few-minutes commercial breaks - so, therefore, it is laden with all the myriad and predictable cliff-hanging moments indicative of those coming commercial breaks. Of course, there are no actual commercials during the film on this DVD - except for the irritating previews one must either watch or skip through to get to the main event - but the rapid succession of fade-to-blacks are the fingerprints of this productions primary commercial function. In short, it is dragged out and padded and instead of keeping viewers on the edge of their seat, it is equally likely to cause one to snuggle back in their seat - and possibly even doze off. It isnt that this take on Ira Levins classic is awfully bad - it just isnt terribly good. In listening to the director and star/producer Zoe Rosemary Saldana talk of their undertaking and the need to offer this day and age a newer perspective on Rosemarys character just made me laugh - for there is nothing in this vision and version of Rosemary that isnt in the character as first exquisitely embodied by Mia Farrow - and, in all honestly, there is a far amount less. Also postulated - especially by director Agnieszka Holland - is that in her version she tried to offer up not so much a horror tale, but a psychological one wherein viewers never quite know what is real or what is merely imagined by Rosemary in her eventually pregnant and possibly paranoidal state. But this is hogwash! Yes, indeed, such a perspective can be most definitely applied to the Polanski version - until the last, chilling moments. However, we see the Devil in the first few minutes in Hollands film. We also are privy to a series of gratuitously violent rub-outs of various characters who get too close to the truth of the very-real witchery involved. And this body-count of deaths-by-Devil are so imitative in style and feel to the killings in THE OMEN, that this miniseries seems like a weird hybrid of both ROSEMARYS BABY and THE OMEN. One saving grace: Jason Isaacs (playing the Satan sycophant) is always a pleasurable pain to watch, ever since his evil incarnate turn in THE PATRIOT. French actress Carole Bouquet as his sincerely hypocritical wife is also a delight. But Patrick Adams doesnt fit in John Cassavetes shoes and hardly seems to be wearing any all his own, and Zoe Saldana is, well, no Mia Farrow. And not that she should be - except, in not bringing anything new and unique to the role herself, well, comparisons are inevitable. Curiously, on the back of the DVD we are told in fairly large letters without quotation marks or critical attribution that ZOE SALDANA HYPNOTIZES. But she really doesnt. And how curious that nowhere on the DVD casing are any of the others actors (with the exception of Patrick Adams) even mentioned, nor is the director or any of the production team. Well, with four Saldanas as producers - including the films star - I suspect these omissions may very well have been by commission. One good thing: given the coming Halloween season my appetite has been whetted to watch ROSEMARYS BABY again - the Polanski version, that is.

With all due respect to reviewer John Bowen, one does not need to be a person who hates all remakes to find this one sadly lacking. Yes, the production values are high and the acting is good. But it is now an entirely different, and far less effective, movie. For starters, to pander to todays audiences bloodlust, a lot of graphic gore has been added, something that was completely absent in the magnificent original. For instance, when Rosemary is told that her apartment building once housed the notorious Trench Sisters, who allegedly indulged in cannibalism, instead of learning about it through a casual reference in conversation, as in the original, here we have to be subjected to a flashback sequence showing the sisters kill and graphically dismember a man, blood squirting in their faces, a hatchet hacking off his arm, etc. And where Rosemarys friend Hutch, who tries to warn her, discreetly dies off camera in a coma in the original (and teasingly leaves us wondering what exactly happened), here he (changed now to an investigative police officer) has convulsions in his car with blood running out of his nose before being squashed like a bug by a large truck that smears him all over the pavement like a giant packet of ketchup. What was gained by this? More detrimental is the fact that this remake gives away too much, way too soon. What made the original such an effective chiller was the fact that so much was left ambiguous up until the end. The viewer of that version has to piece together the various bits of evidence at the same time Rosemary does, so that we share in her gradual discovery and growing horror. In the remake, it is quickly established upfront that the Castevets are evil Satanists who have supernatural powers and can grotesquely kill people at their whim, which they do in several additional scenes of gratuitous bloodshed. As a result, the final revelation that was so shocking in the original becomes entirely anticlimactic, almost beside the point. One is forced to ask why this remake was undertaken at all. Was it just to add visible bloodshed? Why didnt they just come up with a new story in which victims are mangled in graphic detail by Satanists instead of trashing what was and remains a masterpiece? In the hands of Roman Polanski, who adhered remarkably to the details of the original novel, Rosemarys Baby was an extraordinarily effective and subtle psychological thriller that actually made you think even as it more and more scared the bejeezus out of you. Agnieszka Holland, on the other hand, who directed this tasteless trash, has managed to transform it into just another gory slasher flick. No need to think, no need for innuendo, just buckets of blood to satisfy adolescent hunger for gross-out violence. Perhaps Holland should have renamed her hatchet-job Rosemarys Abortion.

I really enjoyed this movie very much. It was nice to have a modern take on the original. Dont get me wrong, the classic version is the best, but this movie is also good. It had diversity. French culture, and a black and white couple. It was easy to hate the bad guys in the original, but it was harder for me to hate the bad guys in this one. Roman made sure that Guy showed Rosemary the support she needed, and Margot was such a class A manipulator coated in sumptuous caramel. The acting was more realistic, and better in some areas. The characters seemed more real. Guy clearly held on to a lot of guilt, versus the original Guy portraying a heartless bastard- but of course we all know that John Cassavetes was luscious, yet excellent at portraying a bastard in some roles. I felt that the modern Rosemary was more trusting and easily sucked into the deception, and then it was too late. However, I felt that the modern Rosemary should have taken longer to piece together the puzzle. She had it pieced together in about ten minutes, whereas the original Rosemary really entertained us while she took some time to piece everything together, more suspense. I was expecting to see a mutated demon-from-hell baby, but was surprised to see an angelic baby that could be featured in a Huggies commercial. Overall, 4 stars.

Good movie.

I love Halle Berry as Rosemary and she really made it believable.

The original is the best, but this is still entertaining.

At first, I thought this was a regular show. I was happy to find out it was a mini series. I liked the original movie. This version however, was awful. One of the stupidest, most boring, predictable, awful ending things I have ever seen. On top of that, the acting, if one would call it that, was about as dry as a tumble weed who has lived in the desert for a hundred years. I actually only watched because I was bored. I would never again watch this version. Such a lame version. In closing, absolutely, awful. One of the worst things I have ever seen.