NBCs Rosemarys Baby is a Mothers Day Card From Hell.
But if you didnt know that going in, I feel bad for you.
Okay, so why isRosemarys Babya great mom story, you might ask.
Well, this is a mother who loved her baby.
This is truly a story of the unconditional love of a mother.
Regardless of what that baby might turn out to be, mommy loves it.
This is the kind of love we see from Cersei Lannister onGame of Thrones.
Cersei is shocked, shocked, by the things her son Joffrey did.
And Cersei is not easily shocked.
But Joffrey is her baby.
He was her first.
The first of his name.
Rosemary has the same fierce mother love.
The other immediate Mothers Day connection is the original Rosemary, Mia Farrow.
I grew up on Mia Farrows Rosemary.
She seemed the epitome of middle-class moms.
It was shorter than The Beatles.
Mias Rosemary supports her husband, a struggling actor.
And she doesnt really complain that shes having a SPOILER ALERT devil baby.
Mia Farrow went on to be one of the great modern symbols of motherhood too.
She adopted a brood.
Forget, for a moment, the scandals that surround the extensions of the extended family.
Zoe Saldana has some big booties to fill.
If you dont like that you could go to heaven.
NBCs version differentiates itself from the original immediately.
It cuts to a shot of an ultrasound and we know were not in the same territory.
you could forget about protecting yourself with modern medicine.
Its not going to help you here.
All the advancements of medical science are no protection for whats to come.
They dont see that theyre being shadowed by lurking figures.
Or how easily they can be manipulated through a purse snatch and an inside job.
Suspense takes a deft hand and there is a terrible tendency lately for television to lay everything out.
Not just that they give clues too soon, but that they do it often and far too blatantly.
Rosemarys Baby is no different.
Everything looks to be too neatly tied together.
Here everything is laid out.
You dont even have a chance to jump to a conclusion.
She really hadnt yet.
We know that shes going to, whether this is fresh or not.
The first time Guy calls her out, it was like a wink at the audience.
Patrick J. Adams Guy is too nice a guy and its not just that he gets pre-emptively defensive.
There is no threat to this Guy.
Hes more of a passive aggressive personality than the truly aggressive predators that are usually drawn to satanic promises.
But there he is, not so clean, but at least hes writing regularly.
Is he supposed to be collaborating with the devil?
Jason Isaacs brings Lucius Malfoys cartoonish evil to Roman Castevet.
Though, Guy is right, who gives a cat as a parting gift?
Carole Bouquet plays Margaux Castevet as a satanic siren wrapped in a bouillabaisse of buoyant French bourgeoisie.
That is, until she prays.
Margaux is the only successfully ambiguous performance.
The demon seed scene, the insemination, was both the highlight and the biggest disappointment.
Where is the naked sagging flesh of life-long sinners?
It looks more like a duck orgy in Disneyworld than a devilishly assisted fertilization.
Im sorry, but Mercata, the devil, might as well have jerked off in a cup.
Viewers could barely tell that this was supposed to be a Black Mass.
Rosemarys supposed to be fucking a goat-horned beast not a fairly hot devil.
And Mercata may be the real devil?
Did I hear that right?
Besides that it was again much too soon, hes supposed to be the real thing?
Where is it ever established that Mercata is Satan incarnate?
Saldana showed off all kinds of possibilities in this sequence.
She also pulled up some heat in the Castavets hallway with the devil.
The Devil is a chintzy ripoff of Robert De Niros Louis Cipher inAngel Heart.
Its also too long.Rosemarys Babylingers too much on incidentals when it could be amping suspense.
The suspense it blasts with fog horns.
Its only the end of the first night and it should have been over already.
So, yeah,Rosemarys Baby, part one, was a Mothers Day gift from NBC.
It will look good on The Hallmark channel one day.
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Rating:
2.5 out of 5
