FANTASTIC FEST: ‘Apartment 7A’ Fails To Establish An Identity

Apartment 7A is entirely wrongheaded in conception. Rosemary’s Baby is a film built on a slow burn as the truth slowly unspools. How does the Paramount+ prequel recapture that tension? Simply put, it doesn’t, but Apartment 7A has enough individual merit as a standalone horror film that it almost stands on its own, although not entirely.

Julia Garner turns in an impressively understated performance as Terry Gionoffrio, who audiences might remember as the character who throws herself out of the window at the start of Rosemary’s Baby. When we meet her in Apartment 7A, Terry is a young dancer living in New York City who blows her shot at fame after an onstage accident leaves her injured. Descending into addiction, she’s taken in by elderly couple Roman (Kevin McNally) and Minnie Castevet (Dianne Wiest), who let her stay in the titular Apartment 7A. Their hospitality improves her life tremendously. She gets another crack at the stage life, while in the background, sinister machinations make her a pawn in the game of evil.

Director Natalie Erika James seems like a really promising talent. She maintains a tight control of tone as well as a razor-sharp focus on Terry’s realistic struggles to find her footing. James and Julia Garner feel like they’re on the same wavelength in terms of making sure that Apartment 7A feels like a frog in a slow boiling pot, letting a gradual evil take hold. Aside from a glossy sheen customary to many streaming service exclusive films, James’ cinematographer Arnau Valls Colomer has a decent grip on the place and time of 1964 New York that becomes more oppressive as Terry’s mental state starts to change.

There’s an impressive inkling of an original idea about the price of fame and just how much Terry is willing to endure in that pursuit. Jim Sturgess (Across the Universe) shines as a shady industry figure. Unfortunately, Apartment 7A is too focused on being a prequel to truly carve out its own path. That could work, taking us into the inner workings of the Satanic cult and expanding out on what we know, assuming the audience has seen Rosemary’s Baby. That’s not quite how Apartment 7A works, however.

The woefully underwritten script by Natalie Erika James, Christian White, and Skylar James wants to replicate the slow burn of Rosemary’s Baby. That could work if the film was divorced from Rosemary’s Baby, giving new audiences their own version. Yet, Apartment 7A wants to remind audiences that the original film exists.

One way of doing that is by having Dianne Wiest and Kevin McNally essentially do impressions of their counterparts from the original—quite well, I might add. Another is in a very obvious recreation of the original’s bedroom scene. At one point, Apartment 7A completely gives up trying to stand alone and starts treading the same path.

The ending scene is the one moment where Apartment 7A truly makes a case for itself. Without giving it away, it marries dance, Satanism, destiny, and the track, “Be My Baby” by the Ronettes. It’s the kind of scene where the film was built around getting to, and it’s easy to see why. It works to such a degree that it almost sells the concept of a prequel entirely. If the whole film had this measure of inspired lunacy, this review would read quite differently.

It’s commendable that Apartment 7A is not overly referential to the original film. Still, it’s far too reverential to the point where it almost feels scared to do its own thing, leading to a movie with a light case of an identity crisis. Natalie Erika James showcases her talent enough to prevent Apartment 7A from becoming a slog. Still, outside of Julia Garner’s commitment, there’s nothing fresh under the hood to recommend visiting Apartment 7A.

Apartment 7A starts streaming on Paramount+ on September 27, 2024.