Polish Posters: Rosemary's Baby

 I highly recommend a search of "polish movie posters" if you get a chance. Better yet, just keep reading the Slammer and I'll be posting quite a few over the next year.  I don't know what got me started on this, maybe it was the super bizarre Godzilla poster I saw in a video on monster poster art or maybe it was one of these... lets say varied... interpretations for the film Rosemary's baby. 

The top image is my favourite... it's great even it it tells you nothing about the actual film. 

The two above really have  different take on the baby part of the name. One is a creature's hand and the other looks almost like a Madonna and child. 

These two obviously have the same inspriationbut took it in wildly different directions. Ones is a very chaste, creepy and , I think well rendered image.. something I might want to draw myself while the other is some sort of 80s exploration film version of the same image. Sexy as Mia Farrow is in the film I just don't see her in that...pose. 

Click the images to see larger versions.

Believe me, this is the just scratching the surface and I'll be exhibiting many more Polish posters soon. 

The Eyes have It.

Rosemary's Baby (1968) is one of my favorite films. The dream sequences / overlapping with the audio that Rosemary was hearing was executed EXACTLY like the Ira Levin novel. It is just glorious. Ruth Gordon is divine and I love that Emmaline "Mrs. Bellows" Henry is in it as a Manhattan matron. The Mad magazine parody "RoseMia's Boo Boo" is fabulous as well.

My first encounter with the film was at age 7 when the film was featured on the Saturday Night Movie on ABC one summer night.

My cousins and I spent every weekend at our New Hampshire "camp" cottages in woods with our parents and grandparents.

The coming attraction came on and all the adults started reminiscing (through a fog of vodka and beer) about the spooky film and how we kids could NOT watch that movie.

"It's too scary!" they slurred at my cousins and I.

We kids all saw the promo clip of its climax with Rosemary shrieking: "What's wrong with his eyes?!!!!"

So of course we kept prying "what was wrong with his eyes?"..."What's wrong with the eyes?"

They wouldn't answer.

Next day cousin Cindy and I continued harping on the mystery. We kept asking my mom about those eyes.

It was 11am, and my hungover Mom blurted out (to shut us kids up) "He didn’t have any eyes."

We were stunned silent.

At age 7, the idea of a baby born with empty eye sockets freaked us out. It was certainly more scary than a demon baby with hooves and a tail.

My cousins and I walked around the field and woods that afternoon trying to imagine such a tragic handicap. ewww Gross.

My cousin Cindy (who came up with our grandparents because her mother worked weekends) went home and asked her mother about the film.

And the next weekend, Cindy told me: "My Mother said that the baby DID have eyes- they were just yellow."

I said: " oh "

Good Grief! Leave it to my Mom to goof it all up - and make it more scary for us.
I guess my dear mother just misunderstood the film's ending -- which reminds me of the old Rodney Dangerfield joke: "My wife aint too bright. It takes her an hour and a half to watch 60 Minutes."

2 years later, the crappy made-for-TV 1976 sequel LOOK WHAT'S HAPPENED TO ROSEMARY'S BABY aired on a Saturday night while we were being babysat by a neighbor who turned it on. I covered my eyes for the duration.

Turns out - in the sequel, Rosemary became Patty Duke and was quickly written off.
Little Adrian - the devil's son - shed his infant hooves and grew up as a normal-looking towheaded boy mentored by Tina Louise. Later, as a young man, he gets drugged & raped by Roman & Minnie's witchy granddaughter.

Monsieur Young? Your cell is ready.

Nobody noticed this signature on Roman Polanski's petition.

Thanks, Stephen.

Sgt. Joe Friday meets Roman Polanski

god bless the youtubes.

Polanski Tate '68 - Fate Awaits

WHOOPSY - LINKS FIXED

Modern Screen May '68

Click para Grande


mmmmm.....yellowed!!

Glorifying The American Girl

?Que? aka What? aka Quoi? aka Che?

Has anyone out there seen this film and if so, where can we get it? Netflix doesn't have though it is finally on DVD. Check out these descriptions:

IMDB:
A young American woman (Sydne Rome) traveling through Italy finds herself in a strange Mediterranean villa where nothing seems right. Her visit becomes an absurd, decadent, oversexed version of "Alice in Wonderland", with Marcello Mastroianni as the maddest of mad hatters and Roman Polanski a kinky March hare.

HKFlix.com
In this erotic comedy from famed director Roman Polanski, Sydne Rome stars as a very sexy and quite bewildered young hitchhiker. As the film opens, she has just escaped the clutches of three would be rapists only to find her way to a seaside villa. Things are, as she discovers, very strange at the villa. She is given a room and, within moments of undressing she is under the peeping eye of a hedonistic pervert, played with bravado by Marcello Mastroianni. She soon encounters the rest of the occupants of the mansion, all are completely anomalous and each tries to persuade into a sexual encounter. Throughout her entire erotic adventure, she carries a diary under her arm and writes curiously impersonal and un-erotic entries. This is the least discussed of Polanski's films, but on some levels it may be his most revealing.


Amazon UK: Product Description
More than three decades after its controversial release, it remains the most butchered, debated and least-seen film of the Oscar winning and controversial director Roman Polanski's entire career. Special features include; 'Sydne in Wonderand' a film about star Sydne Rome; 'Memories of a Young Pianist' a featurette with composer Claudio Gizzi and 'A Surreal Pop Movie' a featurette with cinematographer Marcello Gatti.

Synopsis
Based loosely on the story of ALICE IN WONDERLAND, WHAT? is a dark comedy from Roman Polanski and writing partner Gerard Brach. A young American, Nancy (Sydney Rome), hitchhikes through Europe and finds herself in a remote Mediterranean villa. Wherein she meets some strange inhabitants who lead her deeper into the weird and wonderful rabbit hole. A cult classic, not to be missed!

Ooh, I just spotted it for sale on Amazon (1 new, 1 used) and on TCM's site. Can't wait.