The movie's opening (comprised of a council in the Vatican explaining exactly why the spawn of the devil will be arriving today) wasn't that spectacular, given the fact that after being told by The DaVinci Code that everyone's favorite prostitute was also the father of everyone's favorite jew's child I can digest just about any religious theory with an adequately sized grain of salt. Also, in the future all you religious leaders, let's not be quite so loose on our interpretations of the Bible's passages. "The Beast will rise out of the sea" appartently refers to the "sea of politics" (according to this film), but couldn't it just as easily refer to the ocean, or the "sea of trees" behind my house, or maybe the "sea of shrimp" now available at Red Lobster through August 1st? You tell me.
So a father arrives at the hospital to find out that his wife's baby has died immediately after birth, but that his wife has not yet been told. Since "the child meant everything to her" and since apparently "there is extensive damage to her womb" he decides to take the one baby left in the pound and not tell his wife. Ignorance is bliss, until later in the film his wife gets pregnant again, the priest who lied to him ends up looking like a cross of THE THING and a pteradactyl, and the real mother of the child he adopted turns out to be a jackal. Oh no, this jackal cannot be interpreted to mean "the jackal inside a sinning whore", it's a real friggen dog. Trust me. I saw its skeleton. In a graveyard 50 kilometers out of Rome. What? You'll find it on a map. Get out of here.
So Damien (the boy) grows up happily until his 5th birthday when Sirus black shows up in dog form and convinces a cute little nanny to throw herself from the roof of a nearby church.
Apparently it's all for Damien.
Later on he pisses off some monkeys at the zoo, and throws a bitchfit when his parents try to take him to a church. Eventually he tosses his mother off a 3rd story balcony (if anyone could raise the son of satan, I would think it would be Julia Stiles) and then his helpful nanny - who apparently is also in cahoots with the Beast - finishes off the job.
Finally Daddy Liev figures out what is up, thanks to a crazy priest and a stalkerish photographer (watch something if you see this - no one else in the film smokes so much as one cigarette - save for an Itallian bum who has to, for plot's sake - yet Thewlis's character is constantly plowing through what look to be Marlboro's. Do you think this was originally in the script, or did the crew just get tired of him having to have cigarette breaks and finally just say "Fuck it. You can smoke in the damn film"? I can't wait for Harry Potter 5, just to see if Remus Lupin shows up at an Order of the Phoenix meeting with a pack of Lucky's or a tin of Skoal).
After a visit to a drunken version of Albus Dumbledore (Michael Gambon. Could we get more Harry Potter actors in OMEN II, maybe Emma Watson as Damien's lover or Robbie Coltraine as a homeless panhandler with a love for pasta?) we learn that Liev must stab his son about 86 times to vanquish the evil. Oh, and this stabbing must occur at a church.
I won't tell you how this all pans out, but let's just say that the violence in this movie is like a frozen can of orangejuice concentrate. Whereas films like the recent See No Evil, and basically every slasher flick since 1980, spread their guts and gore fairly evenly throughout two hours, The Omen uses graphic violence only when it is absolutely necessary, and to a greater effect. I thought the cinematography and set design - especially the use of color - was excellent, and with the exception of Julia Stiles, I think the cast was well chosen. Her performance is really the only weak/unbelievable one, and as Roger Ebert noted in his review for the Chicago Sun Times, the British actors are excellent and creepy.
I am not a big horror film fan, but I enjoyed this movie, and it made me jump out of my seat and swear loudly several times (and damn it I was trying to impress those teenage girls!). There's not anything better in theatres until this Friday, when CARS will undoubtedly take over the box office, but A Prairie Home Companion should not be missed.
I know the reviews have been bad, but if you're not a bitter religious freak like Jeffrey Westhoff ("For a movie packed with religious symbols The Omen has little understanding of religion. It arrives at spirituality backwards: The devil is real, so you better believe in God." - Northwest Herald) or a pussy with sensative ears like Phil Villarreal of the Arizona Daily Star ("You'll stumble in your seat all right, not so much out of fear but lack of balance, your inner ear destroyed by random blasts of sound.") you might just have a good time at this film. I know my ear drums can handle an occasional loud noise.
The Verdict: B