The Legion of Mary may well take out a fatwa on this Lady of Fatima inversion of Rosemary’s Baby.

MOTHER has a shocking, literally scorching pre title sequence. Fire and ash give way to verdant vistas, a pristine secluded paradise, an Eden of solitude.

The Adam, credited as Him, is a writer, a poet suffering writer’s block. The Eve, credited as Mother, is his handmaiden, renovating their rural abode, cooking, cleaning, creating a space for him to create. They are newly married yet the union has yet to be consummated.

Into their universe of two, someone comes a knocking, a tubercular doctor, a chain-smoking quack seeking succour.

After a while, he is joined by his wife, a sultry strumpet. Both are welcomed to stay by Him to the bewilderment of Mother.

This couple who have insinuated themselves into the house are then joined by their sons, and a Cain and Abel scenario unfolds.

Then Him rapes Mother and she not so immaculately conceives.

Other fans of Him descend on their dwelling, the infant is delivered, and, well, why wait for transubstantiation when you can film a cannibal feeding frenzy involving infanticide.

Jennifer Lawrence began the year with PASSENGERS, a lightly veneered creep date rape in space saga, and now ends the year with an even more insidious date rape scenario.

Instead of the usual Satanist stereotypes, Javier Badem’s Him seems to be the jealous and cruel God of the Old Testament, blithely giving his only begotten to a crazed death cult of ritualistic zealots.

Writer director Darren Aaronofsky, whose over rated Black Swan at least had under stated horror doesn’t hang back with his critique of Christian iconography and Biblical beastliness.

The first half of the film is pure cinema with heaps of intrigue, but then it calcifies into a confused, chaotic mess, squandering a cast that includes Ed Harris and Michelle Pfeifer.

I think Aronofsky’s best film is The Wrestler, a real story about real people and the real power of redemption. It certainly beats the hell out of MOTHER!