Cult Films: Rosemary's Baby and I Walked with a Zombie

Defining the Cult Film Genre

Both Rosemary's Baby and I Walked with a Zombie are films with explicit elements of what we might commonly think of as "horror." At the same time, both rely so heavily on atmospheric tension and are so laden with strange ambiguity and "arty" moments that they seem to transcend the genre. Given the large following behind both films, they are often just as likely to be described as "cult films" as horror movies.

It is important to realize that what makes cult movies a genre in their own right is not simply poor box office performance or a devoted fan following. Cult movies share many other characteristics and are most typically marked by an otherworldly strangeness and an overriding sense of oddity. Often these films are controversial, and in certain ways they seem to transcend their genre in ways that ordinary or "mainstream" films never would. Both Rosemary's Baby and I Walked with a Zombie manage to do more than typical horror films and deal with controversial issues beyond the scope of most such pictures.

At the heart of both films is a conflict between Western, empirical, rational modes of knowing and more "primitive" magical means of viewing the world. The conflict between these two modes is not resolved quickly or easily, and the ambiguity surrounding which mode of understanding is correct is very much what gives these films their narrative tension. By relying heavily on this ambiguity, both movies create a sense of dramatic tension that amounts to a general anxiety or paranoia. It is in their use of this ambiguity to induce a sort of paranoia in their viewers that these two films realize the element that makes them true cult films, because both possess a strange relationship with their audiences that the average film would strenuously try to avoid.

Atmospheric Tension and General Anxiety

Cult films are typically films that failed to perform well upon initial release but nonetheless managed to develop a devoted and appreciative fan base deeply obsessed with the work and inclined to view it repeatedly — hence the semi-ironic use of the term "cult." The definition of a cult film, however, is not limited simply to poor commercial performance and an ensuing body of intense fan support. Cult films typically possess other common attributes:

"Cult films are usually strange, quirky, offbeat, eccentric, oddball, or surreal, with outrageous, weird, unique and cartoony characters or plots, and garish sets. They are often considered controversial because they step outside standard narrative and technical conventions. Most cult films cut across many film genres (science fiction, horror, melodrama, etc.), although they can be very stylized, and they are often flawed or unusual in some striking way." ("Cult Films")

It is in these oddball and controversial moments that cult films typically find the elements that connect with fans and generate their most interesting scenes. It is also in these controversial and strange aspects that the argument for cult films as a genre becomes coherent: cult films are a genre precisely because of their tendency to mix genres in strange ways and to explore unusual and difficult themes that most "mainstream" films would not touch. It is in these aspects of the cult film that both Rosemary's Baby and I Walked with a Zombie find their sympathetic resonance.

Rosemary's Baby: Rationalism Versus the Supernatural

Both films share a similar approach to dramatic tension — one that is at once intriguing, unusual, and strangely captivating. In the tradition of effective horror filmmaking, both begin with eerie settings. Rosemary's Baby uses a tenement building in New York with a strangely "haunted" past involving witchcraft. I Walked with a Zombie, on the other hand, uses the island of St. Sebastian, whose history of voodoo is imbued with "primitive" animist beliefs. These elements create tension from the very outset, foreshadowing something grim and terrible while leaving the nature of that threat fundamentally unclear.

This ambiguity produces a strange and general anxiety in the viewer: the audience is made to feel concerned but has no specific object on which to direct that concern. The result is the development of a generalized anxiety in which every moment and every line of dialogue is loaded with the possibility of a horrible meaning lurking just below the surface of what appears to be "normal." In this manner, both films construct dramatic tension based largely on a general anxiety that quickly comes to resemble paranoia — every character becomes possibly implicated in a plot against the protagonist.

In both films, this ambiguity is constructed in a more specific way as well. Rather than remaining purely diffuse, it becomes directed toward a single puzzling issue that is not resolved until the culmination of each film.

In both movies the ambiguity moves from an early general anxiety toward a more focused uncertainty centered on resolving one central puzzle. In the case of Rosemary's Baby, the concern becomes not merely what the plot against Rosemary is, but whether her belief that she has been impregnated by the devil is actually correct. A series of terrible and strange circumstances precede this question — most notably Rosemary's interaction with Terry, a woman living on the street who has been taken in by the Castavets. It seems implausible that they would do so for any altruistic reason, and her subsequent suicide casts further suspicion over them.