Fri. May 4

 Has there ever been a more tragic heroine than Rosemary, the kept-in-the-dark mother in Roman Polanski's "Rosemary's Baby"? (Well, yes, there has: Shakespeare created a bunch, and more than a few others have as well.) But Ira Levin created Rosemary and Polanski and Mia Farrow - now mostly a child advocate/avid adoptive mum, infamous for having both Frank Sinatra and Woody Allen as ex-hubbys - brought her plight to life. It's all about creating a child whose education in numerology starts and ends with "666," and it's as spooky a tale of deception and evil - trust no one! good life lesson - as you can imagine. It's about duplicitous doctors, Adults in Service of Satan, a hapless actor selling his soul (that is, Rosemary and the baby) for a shot at fame. It's also a great mystery. How does Rosemary unravel the plot against her and her child? When will she see the benign smiles and reassuring pats? All of this niceness in the face of unspeakable horror - you birthed the devil's child - makes for an excruciating good time. We've seen this film several times, and never fail to stop when we're cable surfing and it's on. You can do better than that, though at the Video Underground in Jamaica Plain on Friday May 4 at 8 p.m. This film, made nearly 40 years ago, presented by Karen Brown and her group Cinescare, a group that believees "Horror cinema is the most revealing vulnerable and significant storytelling human civilization has ever invented... Only horror cinema provokes real-world action - be in objection or attraction - onthe part of its audience." Cinescare was launched last Halloween and its objective is present over 80 years of horror movies and examine, with the audience, the narrative, characters and themes for a sociological lens. We're not sure if there's much value doing this for the routine slice-and-dice movies, but we can certainly see them doing a number on "Hostel." "Rosemary's Baby" sounds like the perfect film for a prodcution called "Horror Springs Forth 2007." This is free, and free pizza comes from Bella Luna.

385 Centre St., Jamaica Plain, 617-522-4949 thevideounderground.com cinescare.com