The Omen

Plot synopsis:
Rome, Italy, June 6, 1966, 6:00 am. Robert Thorn (Gregory Peck) is an American diplomat who hurries to a local hospital where his pregnant wife (Lee Remick) is going into labor. When he gets to the hospital, he is informed that his child was a stillbirth. A priest named Father Spiletto (Martin Benson) then offers him the choice to adopt a baby boy just born at the same time who has no parents. Thorn is reluctant to do so but knowing his wife will be devestated by the news of the death of her real child he agrees to the adoption.The boy is called Damien and moves to England with his mother and father when his father is appointed US ambassador to England. When Damien (Harvey Stephens) is celebrating his fifth birthday party, the family's nanny hangs herself in front of everyone and at the same time, the house is being watched by a rottweiler dog. In the background, a news photographer named Keith Jennings (David Warner) is present taking pictures.A few days later, a new nanny, named Mrs. Baylock (Billie Whitelaw) is sent to replace her but it is clear that she is not as she seems.Mrs. Baylock immediately challenges Kathy Thorn's authority when she is instructed to dress and ready Damien to attend a church wedding with them, but she does as she is told. As Thorn leaves the house, he is badgered by Jennings about circumstances around the previous nanny's death.The Thorns travel to the church one Sunday and Damien becomes more fearful as their car approaches the church. He has a violent reaction in which he injures his mother trying to get away. The car pulls away hurridly and while the Thorns discuss Damien's reaction and whether he should be examined by a doctor, they realize he has never been sick a day in his life.Later, in his office, Thorn is visited by a priest, named Father Brennan (Patrick Troughton), who claims to have been present during Damien's birth in Rome five years ago. He begs Thorn to accept Christ, because only then can he fight the son of the devil. The priest is escorted out by security and Jennings takes note of the visitor, snapping pictures. While developing the pictures of the day, Jennings notices the priest has a dark object like a javelin over his head in the pictures he appears in, but the anomaly doesn't appear anywhere else on the film.The next scene shows Kathy Thorn with Damien, traveling through a safari park, and various animals react with fear or anger towards Damien. It climaxes in a harrowing scene where a group of baboons attack the car that Kathy is driving forcing her to speed away.Meanwhile, Robert Thorn is followed by the priest that met with him earlier and is pulled aside at a public event; the priest tells him that his wife is in danger and he needs to talk to him. Jennings is also at the event, taking pictures. The pictures again show the dark anomaly above the priest.The next day, when Thorn meets with the priest again, Father Brennan again tells him that Damien is the son of the devil, born of a jackal, and will kill everyone around him and will kill his wife's unborn child as well as his wife. The priest instructs Thorn to go to Israel to the city of Megiddo to find a man who can tell him how to kill the son of the devil. Brennan tells Thron about an ancient prophecy that an antrichrist will be born, grow to manhood, and take over the world and lead it into death and destruction. Thorn thinks he is crazy and says never to bother him again. As the priest leaves the park, a sudden rainstorm comes up and the priest is impaled by a church spire in a freak accident while trying to get into a nearby church.Thorn goes home and his wife tells him she is pregnant. Startled by this news, he also receives a phone call telling him to examine the newspaper's cover story about the priest's bizarre death. Kathy has been agitated by Damien of late, causing her to visit a therapist, and tells Robert she wants to terminate the pregnancy. Disturbed by this, Thorn decides to go to the therapist to discuss Kathy's concerns. While Thorn is out, Damien's mother falls over a bannister after being knocked over by Damien, injuring her and thusly killing her unborn child.Jennings calls for Robert Thorn to meet him and he shows him the photographic anomalies with the old nanny and Father Brennan. Thorn tells him about the priest's warnings. Jennings said he is now involved because he found an anomaly on a picture of himself in which he has no neck. Jennings takes Thorn to the priest's residence, which he has access to due to the police investigation into his death, and they find an odd collection of crosses and Bible pages everywhere.Thorn and Jennings travel to Italy together to find the priest that gave him Damien at the hospital. They quickly learn that the hospital where Damien was born burned down in a mysterious fire five years ago, along with all the birth records. They go and find the priest, Father Spiletto, living in a remote monestery only to find him in very grave health. He is severly burned and has movement only in his left hand. Using a piece of charcoal, the priest points him in the direction of Damien's true mother.Thorn and Jennings travel to a local cemetery that lies in ruins, the former site of a shrine dedicated to the devil-god Techulca. They find the gravesites of both Damien's mother and the Thorns' baby... the mother's grave contains a jackal's remains, and the other grave contains a baby whose skull was crushed. Thorn realizes his baby was murdered (apparently by Spiletto and the Satanic conspirators) in order to swap its place with Damien. As they leave the cemetery, they are attacked by a pack of dogs led by a black rottweiler, and manage to escape.Robert calls his wife who is in hospital and tells her to come to Italy. However, she is thrown out of the hospital window by Mrs. Baylock as she gets up out of her bed.Back at the hotel, Thorn receives a phone call and finds out his wife has apparently jumped to her death from her hospital room. In his grief, he tells Jennings that he wants to go to Megiddo and that he wants Damien to die.Thorn and Jennings travel to Jerusalem and find that Megiddo is an archaelogic dig, almost completely underground. A man appears and takes them to Carl Bugenhagen (Leo McKern), the man the priest told Thorn to find. Bugenhagen is an elderly English archeologist who tells Thorn that he has been expecting him. He insists on talking to Thorn alone as Jennings is forced to wait outside the dig site. Bugenhagen gives Thorn seven special daggers, explains their significance and how to kill Damien. He also tells Thorn that Damien will have the mark of the Beast, three sixes, somewhere on his body.Thorn and Jennings leave, and Thorn flings the bundle of knives away saying he won't kill a child. Jennings goes after the knives, saying he will do it, and is suddenly killed in a freak accident when a truck mysteriously shifts into reverse by itself and a sheet of glass slides off the truck and decapitates Jennings in front of Thorn.Thorn flies home alone... with the knives, determined to kill Damien. When he returns to his house that night, he finds a rottweiler dog waiting for him, he succeeds in trapping it in the basement. Thorn then takes some scissors and searches the sleeping Damien's scalp for a birthmark in the form of a series of three sixes. Upon doing so, he discovers the sixes and all doubt about Damien's true identity are diminished. Mrs. Baylock then attacks him and as he takes Damien down the stairs. He fights her briefly before stabbing her with a kitchen knife. He then drags Damien into his car and speeds off to the local church.A police officer sees him speeding and pursues him. Thorn drives to the church with several police cars on his tail. He goes into the church and takes Damien kicking and screaming to the alter. He is about to stab him with the daggers, but he is shot by a police officer.The film ends with Robert Thorn and his wife's funeral in Arlington National Cemetery. Damien is seen having has been adopted by Robert's brother... who is the president of the United States. Damien looks into the camera and smiles somewhat menacingly as the prophecy of the antichrist is being fullfilled....

Tags: mystery, gothic, murder, paranormal, violence, horror, good versus evil, suspenseful

Review:
The haunted performances of the actors, the creepy-crawly musical score, the insinuation that doom is slowly creeping into the world with the birth of one lone child, all succeed in making THE OMEN one of the truest  horror films.
Robert Thorn the American ambassador to Great Britain watches his wife's pregnancy when a priest tells him that his newborn has died, but he convinces him to substitute the baby (the wife not knowing) with another child that lost its mother in labour at the same time.
Billie Whitelaw is pretty much flawless as the evil nanny and Harvey Stephens, although he doesn't say much, is very good as little Damien.The last thing that makes the movie scary are some of the most bizarre deaths.
American Ambassador Gregory Peck has come up with an idea after his new-born son dies at birth: he decides to pass another child off to wife Lee Remick as their own.
Book of Revelation Chapter 13 verse 18 .After the ¨Exorcist¨ , ¨Richard Donner's Omen¨ was one of the most famous films of all time and the major possession movie of the 70s and created an authentic sensation , originating various sequels: ¨Damien, Omen 2 ¨ with William Holden and Lee Grant ,in which Damien is again adopted by a basic couple and proceeds to wreak havoc wherever he goes ; ¨The final conflict¨ with Sam Neill and ¨Omen 4, the awakening ¨ with Faye Grant and Michael Woods ; furthermore a modern remake .
The motion picture is originally written by David Seltzer an compellingly directed by Richard Donner .Followed in 2006 by a remake by John Moore starred by Liev Schreiver and Julia Styles , the inevitable comparison between Schreiber and Gregory Peck reveals that Liev is just too cool for this role and though redundant to original film is a fitting description of the director John Moore ,however is sometimes a shot-for-shot recreation but it doesn't insult the viewer's intelligence.
Lee Remick is strong as Damien's worried mother, Billie Whitelaw chilling as the mysterious governess, and Patrick Troughton ('Dr Who' #2) is very good as a dying priest who knows the truth about the Thorn's son.Forget the sequels, 'The Omen' is classic Satanic schlock, and still has more than a few scares left in it.
The rest of the cast does equally well with some fine performances by Billie Whitelaw as the crazed, manical governess, Patrick Troughton as the conscience-torn priest, David Warner as a helpful photographer, and Harvey Stephens as the young, sweet-yet evil looking Damien.
The first and best in the series of films about devil-child Damien teamed a great cast (Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, David Warner, Patrick Troughton, Billie Whitelaw) with Harvey Stephens in a chilling performance as the child.The deaths most of the cast meet are inventive and in some cases, memorable for many years after viewing the film - giving the opportunity for some unusual and striking visuals, while the whole film is soaked in that loud Goldsmith score to great effect.The sequels, alas, were poor in comparison, but 'The Omen' stands alone of its type of seventies horror schlock..
The book in question makes a big deal of how young Damien's parents experience some ghastly going ons without realising something is seriously wrong , but this is churlish since the audience ( like in most horror movies ) are one step in front of the protagonists , we instantly know what's going on even if the characters on screen don't and this is what makes the narrative so suspenseful , we're waiting for Ambassador Robert Thorn to put two and two together .
Giving roles to well known Brit character actors like Patrick Troughton , Billie Whitelaw , Leo McKern and David Warner also helps the movie a lot The only real criticism I have is that it's not as good as I originally remembered after seeing it for the first time , but that's a problem with a great number of movies I've seen , or that the biblical city of Megiddo is nowhere near the location described in the screenplay ( It is in fact a few short miles west of the border of the West Bank on the route to Jenin ) but that won't matter to 99.9% of the rest of the audience .
Still it is worth seeing.The direction by Richard Donner is great (he really knows how to use a widescreen); Remick and Peck are excellent (although I do wonder how they got them to agree to do a horror film); the deserved Oscar-winning score by Jerry Goldsmith helps the film immensely; the script is good and Billie Whitlaw is downright terrifying as Mrs. Baylock--the scene where she goes after Remick in the hospital has always scared me silly.The deaths are inventive (to put it mildly) but very bloodless.
". The moral dilemmas, the mounting tension, stoic Gregory Peck and Lee Remick coming to their own separate conclusions, the baboons, the Priest, the photographer revelation, the graveyard dogs, that freaking scary Nanny and our beloved Damian: the scariest kid on film as the Antichrist!
it has some of the most horrifying death scenes i think of all time,, I thought this was one of Gregory Peck's better roles that he has done,, Lee Remmick did a fine job as well, loved the child who played Damian also,, but the show goes to the dogs,, those demonic devil dogs gotta love em.
American ambassador Robert Thorn ( Gregory Peck) and his wife (Lee Remick)adapts a baby boy named Damien whom becomes their son.
The acting in this movie is very good even by Peck, Jerry Goldsmith's score is pure classic and some creative shocking kills like the unforgettable death of the priest makes some of today's CGI kills look like a walk in the park.Also recommended: "Rosemary's Baby", "Damien: Omen II", "The Final Conflict", "The Exorcist", "End of Days", "Constantine", "The Antichrist", "Final Destination Trilogy", "The Grudge" (American and Japanese), "Evil Dead II", "The Sentinel", "The Sixth Sense", "The Others", "Stir of Echoes", "Stigmata", "The Ninth Gate", "Seventh Sign", "Hellraiser", "Hellbound: Hellraiser II", "Angel Heart", "The Beyond", "Exorcist: The Beginning", " The Stand", "The Amityville Horror ( 1979)", "Fallen", "Making Contact ( a.k.a. Joey)"..
A superb performance by Gregory Peck is the highlight of this movie which also features a solid storyline, a strong supporting cast (including Lee Remick) and exceptional direction from Richard Donner who makes this a shining example of how to create a slick and highly enjoyable horror/thriller.
The Omen' is not afraid to break all the conventional horror movie rules about survival and timing so the shock-factor is increased for certain scenes while it becomes hard to tell how this film could possibly end?
As its coming up for Halloween, i watched my DVD widescreen copy last night.First up, the opening titles in white lettering on a black background is simple and straight forward, with a slowly revealing shadow of a young child standing over the reflective shadow of a cross to symbolise something evil is coming, plus Jerry Goldsmith's fantastic score simply grabs you by the throat and is responsible for 50% of The Omen's success.When watching the scene where Robert Thorn first sees Damien being held by the Nun through the Hospital glass partition, i noticed that the director Richard Donner takes full advantage of 'framing' a picture superbly with the Priest watching Thorn in the background reflected in the glass saying 'It would be a blessing to her...and to the child.' I saw this a lot in The Omen.
All the cast: Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, David Warner, Billie Whitelaw, Patrick Troughton and Leo McKern play their roles as serious and straight as possible without even a hint of camp or tongue in cheek and it works brilliantly.Every horror film has its 'shocker' moment to send the audience into a frenzy: Alien has its 'chest burster' moment, Scanners has its 'exploding head' moment etc.
Lee Remick is excellent as Kathy, her performance is very vulnerable which only enhances her character's role as a tragic victim.Special mention must go to Patrick Troughton as Father Brennan, a truly remarkable performance as the despairing priest who seems as if hes on the brink of madness, his quiet scene by the canal with Gregory Peck is one of the film's highlights.
David Warner is really good as well as is Billie Whitelaw who is really chilling as Mrs Baylock, even when shes all smiles in her introduction to the Thorn family you sense something really cold about her.Hollywood should hang its head in shame for daring to produce a remake, (which i haven't and do not want to see) a remake that a whole generation will see and think its amazing because they never bothered to view the classic original...it baffles me why they thought they could make one better for a film that was very successful first time around.See the original Omen...it is a Horror Classic and a lot more thrilling and entertaining than The Exorcist.
An American diplomat is told that his newborn son is dead and a priest offers him a solution....to adopt another newborn baby instead and to never tell his wife that their son is dead,It isn't just a great horror film, but a terrific suspense movie also.
The Seventies brought both devil worship and Bible prophecy as subjects for the cinema and the two best known examples of the genre were The Omen and The Exorcist.Gregory Peck is a rich American industrialist whose wife, Lee Remick, has just lost her child at birth.
Directed by Richard Donner best known later for his Superman and Lethal Weapon films, The Omen gained a lot of credibility from the casting of Gregory Peck and Lee Remick as a distinguished American couple living in England, whose young son Damien bears "the mark of the beast".
Jerry Goldsmith's Oscar-winning score works wonders to enhance the movie's creepy atmosphere.It was the performance of Harvey Stephens as the young Damien that invested the film with the chill of genuine credibility.
It also features a violent decapitation scene (caused by a horizontal sheet of plate glass), one of mainstream Hollywood's first: "If there were a special Madame Defarge Humanitarian Award for best decapitation," wrote Kim Newman in Nightmare Movies (1988), "this lingering, slow-motion sequence would get my vote." fares a whole lot better than its 2006 remake.Influenced by the success of The Exorcist, this film takes the horror genre one step further and instead of a girl being possessed by the Devil, we have a boy who's the Antichrist..
Even Jack Palance's daughter, Holly, gets a very memorable role as the Thorns' original nanny, whilst Leo McKern gives a fanatical performance as archaeologist and exorcist, Carl Bugenhagen, which he would continue into 'Damien: Omen II' (1978).The plot itself focuses on the lie that Peck's character, Robert Thorn tells his wife, Kathy (Remick) to conceal the fact that their child was apparently stillborn and that, in desperation, he secretly adopted a child to replace it so as to spare her the overwhelming grief.
It's a classic horror/thriller set-up that you continue to see in original films today.Director, Richard Donner insisted on stripping the script of all glaring Satanic references so as to focus on the inner plight of both Thorn and his wife as they come to suspect that their 'son', Damien (Harvey Stephens - in a role that redefined creepy/evil children in films and culture, generally) is, shall we say, not quite right.
Most think the latter, but Donner wanted to leave the audience guessing and, in many ways, 'The Omen' is best seen as a standalone film, even though the sequels are certainly worth a look.A key point of this film is the fantastically eerie and bone-chilling musical score by the legendary Jerry Goldsmith, who earned an Academy Award for his work on this film.
It was very, very lucky to lure in such stars as it did (particularly in terms of securing such classic American actors as Peck and Remick), as horror was something of a dirty word in cinema at the time and, rather than being another American horror film, the politics- heavy plot is set primarily in the UK, with both Italy and Israel providing a further backdrop to the devilish proceedings.The death scenes are great but, unlike the sequels, the focus is not on them.
Robert Thorn, alike Joe Kennedy, is American Ambassador to the Court of St. James and the Thorns continue to suffer a succession of tragedies throughout the 'Omen' series until Damien Thorn himself is compared to JFK in the 'Omen III: The Final Conflict' (1981).Literally the best in the series, this makes fine Halloween viewing or, if you're like me, you may find this to be a rollicking good psychological thriller for any time of the year -- perhaps one that bears the most re-watching!The only reason that I have not given it 10/10 is that the technical specifications of the time are not always great.
An American ambassador (Gregory Peck) learns to his horror that his son (Harvey Stephens) is actually the literal Antichrist.Some people have compared this film to "The Exorcist", another Satanic film released around the same time.
It however all starts to go wrong at Damien's fifth birthday party and to make matters worse Damien's adopted father Robert Thorn eventually learns that he is actually the devil's son (The Antichrist).This movie is a horror classic and will remain a classic for many year to come.***** out of *****.
It has a grandiose, operatic quality, all enhanced by Jerry Goldsmiths' over the top, thunderous, Oscar-winning score, and has the distinction of boasting elaborate death set pieces, the kinds of things later heavily emulated in the "Final Destination" film series.It also boasts a stellar cast: Gregory Peck ("Gentleman's Agreement"), all warmth and affability, plays Robert Thorn, an American diplomat in Rome whose infant son has died.
One amongst the cycle of "demonic child" films which started with Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby & scaled new heights with William Friedkin's The Exorcist, The Omen may not be as great as those two horror classics but it's still one of the most memorable chillers to come out from the 1970s & even today, its sinister atmosphere manages to work remarkably well for the most part when compared to its counterparts.The story of The Omen concerns Robert & Katherine Thorn whose first child turns out to be a stillborn & in order to conceal the tragic news from her, he adopts a newborn whose mother died in childbirth, and raises him as his own.
But when the boy turns five, strange inexplicable events starts taking place & after the ominous warnings of a priest, Robert decides to uncover the true identity of his adopted child.Brilliantly directed by Richard Donner & deftly scripted by David Seltzer, the one thing I really like about this film is that it is very much aware of its strength & weaknesses and does a fascinating job in working on the former.
Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, David Warner & others chip in with excellent performances and the final shot is one creepy image audience won't be forgetting soon.On an overall scale, The Omen may not have set any new standard in horror filmmaking although it does feature one of mainstream cinema's first on-screen decapitations but it still remains a spooky but entertaining cinematic ride that uses its resources pretty well.
The Omen' is one of those few, in fact very few realistic horror films.Excellent chemistry between Greggory Peck and Lee Remick, the romantic score by Jerry Goldsmith is simply delightful.
The Omen (1976) Fox BluRay 111m Director: Richard Donner Stars: Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, David Warner, Billie Whitelaw, Harvey Stephens Robert Thorn is a successful millionaire.
Naturally, the Devil and its followers have been villains in horror films since almost the beginnings of cinema, however, it was during the decades of the 60s and 70s when three of the most influential horror movies about the Devil were made: "Rosemary's Baby", "The Exorcist", and "The Omen"."The Omen" begins in Rome on June 6, 1966, when American ambassador Robert Thorn (Gregory Peck) receives the news that his new son has been stillborn.
The movie's extremely slow pace doesn't help in this, as while it allows Donner more development for his characters, it also makes the movie be a bit boring at times.It's difficult not to compare this movie to "Rosemary's Baby" and "The Exorcist", as the fact that "The Omen" was obviously inspired by those two masterpieces of horror is hard to ignore.
And, despite the fact that movie is largely story based, we are still treated to some glorious gory highlights, which include a spire being flung through a priest, and what is maybe the best decapitation ever filmed.Gregory Peck, who gives one of his all time best performances, stars as Robert Thorn; the American ambassador in Britain whose wife had a still born baby.
This story keeps you wondering what's happening, pandering on how it's all going to ravel up and what mysterious lie within that cute, innocent cherub Damien.I'm not giving any scenes or nothing away, nothing, GO and watch it if you haven't seen it.All I will say is that it's suspenseful, it keeps you on the edge like other old horror classics have and the score by Jerry GoldSmith is created beautifully in this film.
The Omen, directed by Richard Donner (director of The Goonies) and starring Gregory Peck as Robert Thorn and David Warner as Jennings, is an absolutely fantastic promotor not alone for the supernatural-horror genre, but for the film industry itself.
Between the nanny from hell, and the dark, foreboding priest, with outstanding performances by Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, David Warner, Billy Whitelaw, and Harvey Stephens this has to be one of the greatest horror shockers of all time.