Chapter 2
Today, I’m comparing two films that are from different eras in filmmaking. One was released in 1968 and the other in 2024. One features a married woman and the other an orphan looking to become a nun. While they couldn’t be more different, the two women have one distinct thing in common. They were both impregnated with the son of Satan without their consent. The films themselves also share something I’ve been talking about a lot this month. The color yellow. The First Omen and Rosemary’s Baby utilize the color very differently but the effect is the same. It elevates both films in complexity and beauty.
The First Omen
Father Brennen watches Father Harris as glass shards from a broken red and gold stained-glass window fall around them. “Are you all right?” he asks. “I’m fine,” Father Harris states quietly before turning away. Brennen signs the cross over his chest when the other man’s back is to him. A lengthy triangle of skull and brain have been sliced from the back of Harris’ head.
This scene between actors Ralph Ineson and Charles Dance at the beginning of The First Omen comes right after a conversation between the two about a baby girl born who would now be a teenager. About a plan in place with the intent of birthing the child of Satan. Father Harris’ death at feeling regret over what he has done immediately sets the stage for the horrors to come. Even as Father Harris smiles grotesquely, his bloody teeth visible, an archway behind him frames him in yellow sunlight. An homage to the halos found in religious paintings for hundreds of years. We aren’t meant to see him as holy, though. This was our first warning. Our omen that bad things are coming.
The First Omen is filled with yellow imagery. Lighting in particular is almost always yellow or orange throughout giving an eerie glow to a film where the main character has no idea that she was the baby in question during the opening scene. It is meant to show that something is off. An evil is waiting. The decay of society is in league with him.
When Margaret arrives in Rome, the church she arrives at is painted yellow and ivory throughout the interior. The beds are covered in yellow blankets. A place of serenity. The nun who first welcomes her is framed much in the same way as Harris when Margaret is introduced to her. Her figure set against a yellow arch in the background giving a halo effect. For the viewer, this is a caution. Do not trust this place. Do not trust these people. It is not coincidence that they want this young woman to take the veil. She is to be the unwitting mother of the Antichrist.
In every scene, yellow light is used to frame the scene in such a way that it either gives a halo effect to someone who isn’t worthy of it or give an eerie glow to the scene. When Margaret’s guy friend is hit by a truck, yellow light glows brightly behind him right before contact. When Margaret researches files in the church’s basement, the labels on the files are draped in yellow light making them look sickly. Evidence of the evildoings of the priests and nuns around her. What’s a girl to do with this realization except burn it all to the ground?
Margaret gives birth to twins, a boy and a girl. She is able to take her daughter and flee the fire set upon the church, but her son was taken and would be given to an American diplomat working in Rome named Robert Thorn. If you’ve seen The Omen, you know what happens next.
Rosemary’s Baby
I always cringe when Rosemary paints all that beautiful woodwork of their new apartment white and decorates with yellow textiles, but it lightens the space and makes it seem less menacing. This was Rosemary’s innocence at play. Her inner child decorating her new home with yellow curtains and cushions. She dressed in yellow and white floral babydoll dresses. And she did not see the change in her own husband when they befriended the neighbors. Naïve doesn’t even begin to explain who Rosemary Woodhouse was at the beginning of this film, and it’s pulled directly from Ira Levin’s book for which the film is based on. Little did Rosemary know that yellow is the color of sulfur which, biblically speaking, is associated with hell.
When Rosemary and Guy finally decide to have a baby, Rosemary dresses in a head-to-toe red jumpsuit. This abrupt departure from her standard yellow and white clothing shows how the people around her have terrible intentions. Unbeknownst to her, the chocolate mousse made for her by the neighbor is spiked with something that will put her to sleep. What happens next is one of the most bizarre dream sequences I can remember, and it was never a dream. It was really happening. That red jumpsuit signified something terrible. Something she couldn’t have conceived of in her worst nightmares.
When she realizes late in her pregnancy that her baby is not safe, she tries to flee but ends up trapped in that sunny, yellow and white apartment she painstakingly decorated and is told her baby is dead. Perhaps if she had known more of the world, she would have seen that color for what it was. The color of sulfur. Of hell. Her innocence lost in the very place she felt safe. Her own home and her husband was complicit. He drugged her and let Satan impregnate her without her consent. And then he let the witches next door steal her baby.
Two Films, Similar Themes
What’s a mother to do? Let a religious cult or a witches coven take the baby she held inside herself for nine months? Never. Both Margaret and Rosemary loved their babies even after they found out what their sons were. What they meant for the future of society. Rosemary rocks the cradle and looks down at her son adoringly and in the book even demands the right to name him. Margaret first thought to destroy her son, but can’t bring herself to do so and he is taken from her. Her film ends with hope when she finds out where he is. Maybe one day we will get a sequel.
While Rosemary’s Baby uses yellow to tell a story of lost innocence, The First Omen gives us a cautionary tale. Two women who were too trusting of the people around them. Too naïve to understand the horrors in the world until it was too late. One tried playing house by surrounding herself with a safe color while the other thought wrapping herself in a nun’s habit would be her safety net. Both were gaslit by the people around them. Drugged so Satan could have his way with them.
For two films made 56 years apart, these themes are shockingly similar but never derivative. A strength for both films to be certain.
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Becky Tyler Art and Photography 
Chapter 2
Today, I’m comparing two films that are from different eras in filmmaking. One was released in 1968 and the other in 2024. One features a married woman and the other an orphan looking to become a nun. While they couldn’t be more different, the two women have one distinct thing in common. They were both impregnated with the son of Satan without their consent. The films themselves also share something I’ve been talking about a lot this month. The color yellow. The First Omen and Rosemary’s Baby utilize the color very differently but the effect is the same. It elevates both films in complexity and beauty.
The First Omen
Father Brennen watches Father Harris as glass shards from a broken red and gold stained-glass window fall around them. “Are you all right?” he asks. “I’m fine,” Father Harris states quietly before turning away. Brennen signs the cross over his chest when the other man’s back is to him. A lengthy triangle of skull and brain have been sliced from the back of Harris’ head.
This scene between actors Ralph Ineson and Charles Dance at the beginning of The First Omen comes right after a conversation between the two about a baby girl born who would now be a teenager. About a plan in place with the intent of birthing the child of Satan. Father Harris’ death at feeling regret over what he has done immediately sets the stage for the horrors to come. Even as Father Harris smiles grotesquely, his bloody teeth visible, an archway behind him frames him in yellow sunlight. An homage to the halos found in religious paintings for hundreds of years. We aren’t meant to see him as holy, though. This was our first warning. Our omen that bad things are coming.
The First Omen is filled with yellow imagery. Lighting in particular is almost always yellow or orange throughout giving an eerie glow to a film where the main character has no idea that she was the baby in question during the opening scene. It is meant to show that something is off. An evil is waiting. The decay of society is in league with him.
When Margaret arrives in Rome, the church she arrives at is painted yellow and ivory throughout the interior. The beds are covered in yellow blankets. A place of serenity. The nun who first welcomes her is framed much in the same way as Harris when Margaret is introduced to her. Her figure set against a yellow arch in the background giving a halo effect. For the viewer, this is a caution. Do not trust this place. Do not trust these people. It is not coincidence that they want this young woman to take the veil. She is to be the unwitting mother of the Antichrist.
In every scene, yellow light is used to frame the scene in such a way that it either gives a halo effect to someone who isn’t worthy of it or give an eerie glow to the scene. When Margaret’s guy friend is hit by a truck, yellow light glows brightly behind him right before contact. When Margaret researches files in the church’s basement, the labels on the files are draped in yellow light making them look sickly. Evidence of the evildoings of the priests and nuns around her. What’s a girl to do with this realization except burn it all to the ground?
Margaret gives birth to twins, a boy and a girl. She is able to take her daughter and flee the fire set upon the church, but her son was taken and would be given to an American diplomat working in Rome named Robert Thorn. If you’ve seen The Omen, you know what happens next.
Rosemary’s Baby
I always cringe when Rosemary paints all that beautiful woodwork of their new apartment white and decorates with yellow textiles, but it lightens the space and makes it seem less menacing. This was Rosemary’s innocence at play. Her inner child decorating her new home with yellow curtains and cushions. She dressed in yellow and white floral babydoll dresses. And she did not see the change in her own husband when they befriended the neighbors. Naïve doesn’t even begin to explain who Rosemary Woodhouse was at the beginning of this film, and it’s pulled directly from Ira Levin’s book for which the film is based on. Little did Rosemary know that yellow is the color of sulfur which, biblically speaking, is associated with hell.
When Rosemary and Guy finally decide to have a baby, Rosemary dresses in a head-to-toe red jumpsuit. This abrupt departure from her standard yellow and white clothing shows how the people around her have terrible intentions. Unbeknownst to her, the chocolate mousse made for her by the neighbor is spiked with something that will put her to sleep. What happens next is one of the most bizarre dream sequences I can remember, and it was never a dream. It was really happening. That red jumpsuit signified something terrible. Something she couldn’t have conceived of in her worst nightmares.
When she realizes late in her pregnancy that her baby is not safe, she tries to flee but ends up trapped in that sunny, yellow and white apartment she painstakingly decorated and is told her baby is dead. Perhaps if she had known more of the world, she would have seen that color for what it was. The color of sulfur. Of hell. Her innocence lost in the very place she felt safe. Her own home and her husband was complicit. He drugged her and let Satan impregnate her without her consent. And then he let the witches next door steal her baby.
Two Films, Similar Themes
What’s a mother to do? Let a religious cult or a witches coven take the baby she held inside herself for nine months? Never. Both Margaret and Rosemary loved their babies even after they found out what their sons were. What they meant for the future of society. Rosemary rocks the cradle and looks down at her son adoringly and in the book even demands the right to name him. Margaret first thought to destroy her son, but can’t bring herself to do so and he is taken from her. Her film ends with hope when she finds out where he is. Maybe one day we will get a sequel.
While Rosemary’s Baby uses yellow to tell a story of lost innocence, The First Omen gives us a cautionary tale. Two women who were too trusting of the people around them. Too naïve to understand the horrors in the world until it was too late. One tried playing house by surrounding herself with a safe color while the other thought wrapping herself in a nun’s habit would be her safety net. Both were gaslit by the people around them. Drugged so Satan could have his way with them.
For two films made 56 years apart, these themes are shockingly similar but never derivative. A strength for both films to be certain.
Discover more from Becky Tyler Art and Photography
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
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