"A Chalky Undertaste"

…Capsule #3: Rosemary’s Baby

Deciding to write capsule reviews for movies only seen in theaters leaves me mostly with contemporary options, as there are not many repertory houses or film series in Rhode Island. When I noticed The Jane Pickens Theater in Newport had a list of classic horror movies playing in October it filled me with nostalgic anticipation. These capsules are just as much about cinema spectatorship than the movies themselves, and my experience took me back to right around my eighteenth birthday, when I worked at The Pickens for a summer. I was reminded of simpler times and also a kind of excitement for cinema that dulls with critical saturation and maturity. Watching Rosemary’s Baby there a couple weeks ago got me thinking about what it would have been like seeing it there during the original run in 1968, when the theater was still The Strand. I asked my parents if they saw it then, which would’ve been a year before they were married. They remembered the title, but not if they saw it.

Watching a movie that you already know is perfect can only be done as a comfort watch or a particular theatrical experience. I always wondered what some of the shots in Rosemary’s Baby would look like on a big screen, having only seen it on TV monitors up until now--The shot where Guy (John Cassavetes) answers the phone in the other room, the camera wishing it could see him in the doorway, before slowly creeping to the right. It is a subtle shot that remains completely memorable--a purely visual way of creating suspense, at a time when it isn’t expected. Mia Farrow’s paleness and pregnant emaciation is that much more harrowing when you watch it in a theater. And near the end, those pills she hides in the crevice of her bed backboard build a tension that is not apparent on a TV screen. It is a movie that is still pleasurably gripping and anxiety-inducing half a century later. It is also unfortunately still relevant, with its story of men unifying to control women’s bodies behind a facade of religious justification.  

Part of me wants to research where Rosemary’s Baby played on Aquidneck Island during its original run. If not The Strand, it could have been The Opera House right down the street, or The Showcase or Island Cinemas in Middletown. Aside from The Pickens they are all closed now, making these repertory experiences that much more valuable.