Season of the Witch
Rosemary’s Baby (1968) and Alison’s Birthday (1981)
Every weekend takes a different shape, often the films I plan on watching are the framework for how I schedule my time. I check the Metrograph calendar to see what’s showing in case I want to cap my day of running around seeing art exhibitions with a film that can send me into an existential tailspin, I also look to see what’s on at Film Forum or IFC for this same purpose, but lately I’ve been streaming from home. The thing about living in a city like New York is that you never know how the weather will play out at any given point during any of the seasons. A massive snow storm could barrel through the boroughs wreaking havoc on the already stressed Metropolitan Transportation Authority or I simply do not want to feel like my face is melting off on my way to or from a theater. I don’t spend much time at home during the week, so laying down on my couch with a throw blanket and candle glowing on my coffee table to set the mood is pure luxury to me. Plus, I have an innumerable amount of options to choose from to suit whatever mood I’m in. With this many choices at my fingertips, though, I often have trouble deciding what to watch. If this is the case, I make a remote click beeline to the Criterion Collection’s Featured Collections to comb through their curated selections of thematic films for the month.
I was intrigued with their assortment for October where witches dabble in the dark arts to alter their lives and the lives of those around them. In the description for this block of movies, they note that these characters are “embodying cultural fears and fantasies around powerful women and the shadowy, forbidden flip side of the everyday patriarchal order, witches have captivated audiences almost since the beginning of filmmaking…[these films] have made women who dabble in the dark arts symbols of pop empowerment, occupying their own space between the earthly and supernatural and connecting ancient traditions to modern rituals.” Growing up Catholic, media centering the occult or witchcraft fascinated me since it was forbidden. I’ll never forget my second grade teacher, who was a nun, threw a fit when the Harry Potter books found their way into my classmates’ hands. I never understood what the big deal was and quite frankly, going to Catholic school (and going to church a minimum of twice a week depending on the season) piqued my curiosity for these topics even more. The two movies I ended up watching in this collection do not fit within this framework, my deep rooted nature to go against the grain asserts itself subconsciously sometimes, like a weed. Rosemary’s Baby (1968) is classic for many, myself included. I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve watched this. Whenever I find myself near The Dakota, I always turn this on as soon as I come home. I also can’t watch it without hearing Tyra Banks’s sing-songy voice explain to a contestant on America’s Next Top Model (season 5) how she wanted her hair to look post-makeover, “I specifically said Mia Farrow from Rosemary’s Baby.” But what puzzles me with the collection description and what happens in this film is that Farrow’s Rosemary is not the witch. She is the victim of the witches. Unbeknownst to her, the people closest in and next door to her home made moves to elevate their lot in life at her expense. Same goes for our protagonist Alison in the Australian cousin film to Rosemary’s Baby titled Alison’s Birthday. Two joyous, celebratory life events are soured with tannis root and tranquilizer.
Everyone I know has been processing the results of last week’s presidential election with their head in their hands, wondering what will happen to our country over the course of the next four years. When I sat down to get into the Halloween spirit by watching these films pre-election, I couldn’t stop thinking about how little power both of these main women hold in their situations and each time they are about to get a taste of freedom, it is swiftly taken away. Paired with the precarious state of rights over bodily autonomy in this country, Rosemary’s Baby and Alison’s Birthday transcended their initial horror to become metaphors for the real terrors in contemporary America.
Rosemary’s Baby, dir. Roman Polanski, 1968
La la la la la la la la la la la la la la…a soft voice sings over the slow camera pan of upper Manhattan, from the East Side to the West Side before landing on the central location, The Dakota. Rosemary and Guy Woodhouse are newlyweds on the hunt for a place to raise their future family. Unfortunately, Guy is a failed actor despite his many attempts at making a name for himself in Hollywood. Surely these two, like many young couples in the city, are borrowing family funds to build their nest. They tour a unit in the Dakota Bramford that was once inhabited by an elderly woman with a penchant for cultivating houseplants and boarding up a perfectly good linen closet.
After the happy couple moves in, Rosemary takes on the role of interior designer, brightening up the previously dark interiors with fresh paint and wallpaper. During a trip to the building’s laundry room she meets her neighbor’s, Minne and Roman Castevets, young helper/helpie Terry who shows off her stinky “good luck charm” of a filigree pendant filled with tannis root. The next time Rosemary sees Terry is in a puddle of her own blood outside their building. The Castevets stumble through the crowd to identify the women they once helped in the most deadpan of line deliveries and soon set their sights on their newlywed neighbors. They want active, living blood.
I am always telling everyone that the main lesson from this film is to avoid your annoying, nosey neighbors. Soon after this tragedy Minnie is banging on the Woodhouse’s door at any given time of day. As soon as she finds out they are trying to conceive, her attempts at involvement are incessant. She gifts Rosemary Terry’s “good luck charm” and hand delivers chocolate mousse to the Woodhouses on their date night at home. The hairs on Rosemary’s neck start to stand up each time Minnie comes to her door, she knows something is up but can’t quite put her finger on it. Guy has grown warmer to the older couple, but maybe that is due to his recent role he scored after the original actor goes blind unexpectedly. He’s in a good mood with them, but turns against Rosemary when she complains about their meddling. After having a few bites of the mousse with a “chalky undertaste,” she falls asleep, dreaming of her friends on a boat. In the meantime a demon is ravishing her as a group of nude onlookers, including her husband and the Castevets, chant the monster on.
Once Rosemary finally becomes pregnant, her dream of having a child turns into a nightmare. Subsisting on merely a blended up creamy concoction of “medicinal” herbs and who knows what else, she develops her own lust for flesh via nearly raw meat. Two scenes I found the most chilling was when Rosemary catches herself feasting on raw gizzards in the reflection of a toaster and when she quickly flash fries an unseasoned and undercooked steak. Honestly, she is probably just nutrient deficient from following the oddly specific advice of her obstetrician and friend of the Castevets, Dr. Sapirstein. As her pregnancy continues, she uncovers more details about her sinister neighbors, information left to her from her dear friend Hutch. The more she learns about their Satanic ties, the more she wants to leave her current life to start anew with her baby. However, as soon as she believes she finds solace in the doctor she wanted to see from the start, Dr. Hill, he turns her in to her original OB and husband.
In quick succession after waking up after having her child extracted from her abdomen without her consent, she learns who his real father is. The coven is his family. Her intuition was always right.
Alison’s Birthday, dir. Ian Coughlan, 1981
I have never heard of this film before, but it deserved to be mentioned in the same conversations with Rosemary’s Baby. When Alison is sixteen, her and her friends do what any teenage girls do during a slumber party: summon spirits with an ouija board. However, instead of just calling whoever is around to make themselves known, an entity possesses her friend and warns Alison of future danger on her 19th birthday.
Fast forward three years, Alison and her boyfriend Pete are on their way to drop her off at her Aunt Jenny and Uncle Dean’s home for a visit. As she gets acclimated to their home, she stumbles upon a Stonehenge-like structure in their backyard after being warned to not bother venturing around the property. Soon Alison is having nightmares of rituals taking place in this modern ancient structure. She also meets her 103 year old grandmother she never knew she had in the middle of the night.
Pete’s suspicions of Alison’s relatives grows as they force a distance between the young couple. Soon, they strike sedation into Alison, explaining she is sick and can’t see him anymore. Now, Pete is the opposite of Guy. He knows something is not right about this situation and does his research to save his girl! He goes to the library put information together that this aunt and uncle of hers kidnapped her from the hospital when she was young and, with information supplied by his astrologer friend Sally, discovers that when Alison turns nineteen she would be the ultimate sacrifice for their Celtic cult demon named Mirna (who is currently the grandmother living in an all blue room).
To try to stop the transfer of Alison’s spirit into the grandmother, making her Mirna, he fights off the cult members with a gun and a crucifix (which he randomly stopped at a church to get, ripping it off a wall LOL). Both Alison’s and Pete’s lives are forever changes after this night. Being a teen is rough, but being a teen unknowingly trapped in a cult is the worst.
When I originally did my double feature watch of these films, I was taken with the fascination of pendant necklaces and covens. I mentioned the silver filigree orb in Rosemary’s Baby, but both Alison and Mirna wear the same oval pendant with rectangles at the 12 and 6 clock points and unfurling scrolls filling the majority of the space between them. A nod to the ceremony at the backyard stone perhaps? Alison’s get upgraded to the supersize version after her and her grandmother do their freaky birthday spirit exchange. I tried to research the correlations between covens and their predilection for a bold necklace, but my search results turned up shoppable options. I can’t in good conscience recommend any, your fate is in your hands, at least for now.