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Click Here For Our Interview with Julia Stiles

The Omen

Review By: Stephen Snart
StephenSnart@TheCinemaSource.com

Another year, another remake of a classic British film hits the screens. With each release I have to ask myself: What is the incentive and is the result justifiable? As far as I can tell the primary reason for 20th Century Fox to greenlight this production must have been to capitalize upon the uniquely demonic release date: June 6th, 2006 i.e. 06-06-06. Fox has gone to daring lengths to take advantage of this once-in-a-millennium release date. Firstly, June 6th falls on a Tuesday, a rather unusual day for a film to open. Of course, the sporadic Christmas Day release opens on a Tuesday and the occasional blockbuster like Terminator 3 will have 10 PM screenings on a Tuesday night but the decision to roll out wide on a Tuesday is a bold one, especially considering that most schools are still in session. Even more audaciously, the main marketing push has been to plaster minimalist, innominate black billboards around town that simply read “6 + 6 + 06 You have been warned.” The decision to keep the film’s title absent from the billboards is a risky move. Up until a few days ago I thought the advertisements were promoting a new Jay-Z album or something of the like.

Why all this time spent discussing the marketing of the film and not the film itself? Well, unfortunately the film is not nearly as fresh and exciting as its release strategy. Liev Schreiber stars as Robert Thorn, the US ambassador to London, who finds himself grappling with the difficult realization that his son may be slightly more satanic than the average child. As the film opens, Thorn is informed by an elderly priest that his wife, Katherine(Julia Stiles), has suffered complications during child birth and as a result their baby died during delivery. Broken-hearted, Thorn is persuaded by the priest to adopt a simultaneously born baby and to raise it as his own.

As Damien (Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick) grows older, he becomes emotionally vapid, only showing signs of life through occasional violent outbursts. Despite his obviously abnormal behavior, Robert and Katherine remain oblivious and it takes far too long for them to get around to acknowledging something is amiss with their child’s personality. A nervous Father Brennan (Pete Postlethwaite) soon enters the picture, skulking around, trying to convince Thorn that his child is demonic and must be destroyed as soon as possible. Thorn is obtusely resistant to the possibility and refuses to act until Damien’s wrath has been felt by various people around him. The rest of the ensemble is made up of David Thewlis as an unsavory photographer and a perfectly cast Mia Farrow as Damien’s mentally unbalanced nanny, Mrs. Blaylock.

With the glaring exception of Julia Stiles, the cast is relatively solid. While she has given charming performances in films like 10 Things I Hate About You, and ...