Warning: This post contains spoilers!
The Omen is a good example of a terrific stand-alone movie that was forcibly serialized in the hopes of making money. When 20th Century Fox released the first Omen film on June 6, 1976 to unexpected critical and commercial success, the studio most likely saw potential for a franchise goldmine.
The Omen is a classic horror film, and quite frankly there really isn’t much to be said on the matter. Coming right at the tail end of the popularity in devil/possession movies, The Omen could have been yet another head-spinning, vomit-throwing, Exorcist wannabe. Instead it turned out to be a breath of fresh air, an exciting film that — while borrowing elements from Rosemary’s Baby and other supernatural horror movies — held its own as a true original.
While the success of The Exorcist let loose a wave of imitations, so did The Omen, including the 1977 Antichrist Kirk Douglas melodrama Holocaust 2,000. And like Exorcist, The Omen got its own sequel. Well, three sequels, actually!
Whereas The Omen feels fresh and exciting, Damien: Omen II (1978) feels old fashion, and often meandering. After archeologist Bugenhagen (Leo McKern), the man who informed Gregory Peck of the daggers, learns of Damien’s survival after the events of the first film, he along with a friend is killed. Seven years later, Damien (Jonathan Scott-Taylor), now 13, is living with his clueless uncle (William Holden) and aunt (Lee Grant) in Chicago and attending military school where he’s watched over by the sinister Sergeant Neff (Lance Henriksen).
Whereas Peck and Lee Remick (as Damien’s mother) felt personable and likable in the first movie, Holden and Grant come off as unsympathetic and cold. A reason for this becomes clear during the last several minutes of the film (secrets revealed!) for at least one of the characters. Henriksen is wasted in a small role that amounts to no more than a convenient plot point.
Omen II also suffers from laziness. A sequel about Damien reaching pubescence and coming into his own should really give us full-throttle spectacle, a sort of male version of Carrie, if you will. The filmmakers were most likely trying to avoid sensationalism in that regard, but in doing so really shot themselves in the foot. Director Don Taylor (also once an actor – Stalag 17) gives the film a feel of stoicism, the opposite of Donner’s fast-paced direction; Omen II is so grounded in its soap opera stuffiness that it forgets to just have fun.
Then we come to The Final Conflict (1981), which at the time was planned as the closing of the Omen trilogy.
Now in his early 30s and CEO of Thorne Industries, Damien (Sam Neill) becomes appointed by POTUS as the new US Ambassador of Great Britain after the previous one commits suicide. Meanwhile, a sect of priests from first film’s Italian monastery is hot on Damien’s heels. Their plan is to execute Damien before he can thwart the second coming of Christ. Damien’s plan, though, is to murder every male infant born in Britain on the morning of March 24th of that year — the same morning in which a constellation generates the “second star of Bethlehem.” Yeah, I really didn’t get it, either.
Final Conflict looks great (the cinematography by Phil Meheux and Robert Paynter is gorgeous), and there’s no question Neill has great fun in the role of Damien; the screenplay (by Andrew Birkin) gives Damien a few juicy moments. But much like Omen II, Final Conflict doesn’t deliver the goods. It’s almost as if the filmmakers forgot they were making a movie about the Antichrist! Also, by this point in the series the “creative deaths” have been all but erased from the show.
The film attempts to sell a pointless rape as an example of Damien’s evil nature, but the scene really comes off as tasteless and sleazy. It’s made even more tacky when Damien, while sodomizing his girlfriend (Lisa Harrow), mutters something about life being pain, or some such nonsense. Wouldn’t the son of Satan have better things to do?
The series also seems to have forgotten its own rules. In the first film Bugenhagen tells Thorne (Peck) that all seven daggers must be used in order to kill Damien. Harrow stabs Damien with one dagger and he still dies. Poof. OK, bye!
In closing, The Omen is a wonderfully fun and inventive piece of 70’s cinema that was needlessly followed by underwhelming sequels. The remake from 2006 managed to capture some of the energy from the ’76 film but could not measure up at the end. I think The Omen was a movie of its time and part of that era’s culture, which can’t be replicated.
The Omen saga is now available from Shout! Factory in a deluxe Blu-ray. box set. The series, as well as the remake, are currently streaming on Hulu.