Rosemary’s Baby might be the consummate film about natal anxiety, but Everything Put Together makes a strong impression of its own without resorting to the supernatural. Angie (Radha Mitchell) seems almost offensively happy. House in the suburbs, SUV, sensitive hubby, funny friends who talk about babies, and a pregnancy come to term. She gives birth to a splendid boy; then three hours later, her world lies in ruins. More infants die of SIDS (sudden-infant-death syndrome), the doctor explains, than most other ailments combined. " You just never hear about it. " Small comfort, and Angie sinks into near-psychosis, her husband bewildered, her friends scared off; even her mother, faraway and unaware, sends her baby clothes.

Such a premise seems doomed to melodrama or platitudes, but director Marc Forster, whose Monster’s Ball is upcoming, avoids both, relying on poignant details and subtle cutting. At times he overdoes the heavy sound effects, the skewed camera angles (from floor level, as if from a toddler’s point of view?), and bogus suspense (the door opens . . . to an empty storage room!) more appropriate for Polanski. For the most part, though, Everything Put Together is a wrenching depiction of what happens when everything gets undone.