The Omen Trilogy - Hell Hath No Fury Like An Anti-Christ Scorned

THE OMEN TRILOGY

HELL HATH NO FURY LIKE AN ANTI-CHRIST SCORNED

Update: I donated my beloved VHS Box Set to a Charidee Shop as I have now replaced it with both the DVD and Blu-Ray releases, the dreaded remake of The Omen 1976 was released in 2006 which I saw just once and was bloody (see what I did there?!) awful, an abomination in fact (apart from the cameo by Harvey Stephens, of course!), and keep this last one to yourselves but, on reflection, I don't think Omen IV (the "Made for TV" effort) was all that bad, as it happens!

From when I first saw The Omen Trilogy at the age of 13 or 14, I loved everything about it.  I’m not hugely, if at all, religious, but I thought that the concept was such a fantastic idea.  I DO believe in the supernatural, however, so I enjoyed that aspect of the series of films a great deal.  The blood and gore also, as illustrated through a variety of spectacular deaths, is just wonderful.  I thought that all 3 movies were very well made, and didn’t seem to take themselves too seriously (unlike The Exorcist, for example. Isn’t it weird that the young assistant priest in that film was also called Damien?  Strange or what?!!). But, whereas the first two Omen films were helped by the fact that the actors playing Damien when he was 5 and 12/13 were good enough to be uncannily evil in appearance despite (or even due to!!) their young ages, I felt that in the last one, Sam Neill overdid the furtive and evil glances a touch, and didn’t seem to carry it off quite as well.  Nevertheless, in my humble opinion it wasn’t a bad effort, and the horrific death scenes more than make up for it!!  So then, there now follows a brief-ish rundown of each film, the leading characters and beasts of the night who protected and aided Damien in his quest to conquer the world and deliver evil to one and all.  Scared?  You should be…..

THE OMEN                                                                      1976

MAIN PLAYERS:	GREGORY PECK	Ambassador Robert Thorn
	LEE REMICK	Katherine Thorn
	HARVEY STEPHENS	Damien Thorn
	DAVID WARNER	Keith Jennings
	BILLIE WHITELAW	Mrs Baylock
	PATRICK TROUGHTON	Father Brennan
DIRECTED BY:	RICHARD DONNER
EVIL CREATURES:	ROTTWEILERS (“Devil Dogs”)

This debut film of the series concerns itself with the birth of the Anti-Christ, and the impact his first, formative few years has not only on his so-called parents, but also on anyone who even comes close to discovering his true identity.  Gregory Peck is Robert Thorn, who belongs to an incredibly wealthy and successful family.  His wife, Katherine, has their first child, born on the 6^th day of the 6^th month at 6 am (of course!!), who dies not long after he is born.  Unknown to Robert, this was pre-planned and was no accident.  He then adopts another baby, but Katherine has no idea that the child is not their own. 

A few years go by with no problems, but then, when Damien reaches the age of five, a series of unexplained and horrible deaths begin to occur.  First, Damien’s nanny hangs herself in the middle of his birthday party (talk about inconsiderate!!), then the priest trying to warn Robert of Damien’s real calling in life gets impaled by a steeple from his own church for his troubles.  Before long Robert, with the aid of canny (and kooky!!  Fab, darling!!) photographer Keith Jennings, comes to realise that he IS raising the Anti-Christ.  Unfortunately, his wife and their second (unborn) child are the next victims, she being most unceremoniously thrown from her hospital bed (after Damien put her there in the first place by knocking her off a high balcony on his tri-cycle, and conveniently putting an end to the pregnancy in the process) into an ambulance several feet below by Mrs Baylock, the replacement (and completely insane) nanny.

Whilst Robert and Keith are investigating the background of Damien, Keith is decapitated in Meggido (meaning Armageddon) by a sheet of glass (nasty!!), after first stating that he would kill Damien with the Seven Knives of Meggido as instructed by an exorcist (Bugenhagen, played by Leo McKern who was uncredited - scandalous!!), if Robert couldn’t bring himself to do it.  Last of all to go is poor old Robert himself who, now back in London, has had to see off the nanny from hell (literally!!) after a huge (fatal) scrap, abduct Damien and take him to a church to carry out the stabbing.  Robert is shot down by a cop, and the last thing we see is Damien smiling away at the double funeral of his “parents”.  The evil little monster!!  He is holding the hands of the President of the United States of America and his wife, who were good friends of Robert and Katherine.  They are completely unaware that he is grinning like a Cheshire cat, or that he was responsible for their deaths in the first place.  It will be many more years, and many more deaths, before the world knows of the evil of Damien Thorn…..

  

DAMIEN:  OMEN II                                                          1978

MAIN PLAYERS:	WILLIAM HOLDEN	Richard Thorn
	LEE GRANT	Ann Thorn
	JONATHAN SCOTT-TAYLOR	Damien Thorn
	LUCAS DONAT	Mark Thorn
	SYLVIA SYDNEY	Aunt Marion
	NICOLAS PRYOR	Charles Warren
	LANCE HENRIKSEN	Sergeant Neff
	ROBERT FOXWORTH	Paul Buher
	LEW AYRES	Bill Atherton
	ALLAN ARBUS	Pasarian
	ELIZABETH SHEPHERD	Joan Hart
	MESHACH TAYLOR	Dr Kane
DIRECTED BY:	DON TAYLOR
EVIL CREATURES:	RAVENS (Black, naturally!!)

It is now 7 years on, and Damien is living with his “uncle” Richard Thorn, brother of the unfortunate Robert, his “cousin” Mark, “aunt” Ann and (Great) “aunt” Marion, who despises him because of what happened to Robert.  He has no idea of who he really is, but will find out with a vengeance before the film is over.  He and Mark are both at a Military Academy, and during the current semester have an interesting time of it!!  The new platoon leader, Sergeant Neff, is in fact one of the devil’s own, and keeps a watchful eye on Damien as the day of reckoning dawns.  He eventually tells Damien to read a certain passage in the Book of Revelations from the bible, which will let him know of his true identity.  Before this happens, however, his “aunt” Marion dies, seemingly of a heart attack, because she was a threat to Damien inheriting the Thorn dynasty and fortune and, therefore, POWER.

Anyway, Damien reads the passage and, being the super-intelligent bright spark that he is, immediately goes to the bathroom to look for the tell-tale birthmark sign of 666 about his person.  When he finds it, on his head underneath his hair, he is completely horrified and goes off on a mad run to contemplate and come to terms with what he has just discovered about the real him.  After this has occurred, he seems to realise that anyone who threatens the well-being of either himself or Thorn Industries, his “family’s” business and his future heritage, must die a terrible and fabulous death.

But, in the meantime, whilst all of this is coming about, yet more demise is on the horizon.  Firstly Joan Hart, a journalist friend of Keith Jennings (who was the photographer in the original film), hits the bullet.  She has seen Yigael’s Wall, which was discovered with the remains of Bugenhagen after the archaeological site was reduced to ruins in mysterious circumstances 7 years earlier.  On this wall are the faces of the Anti-Christ from birth to downfall, and it is indeed the face of Damien.  After seeing Damien in the flesh, she flees, only to end up stranded on a deserted road.  As she is about to head off to a house in the distance for help, she is attacked by a lone raven which pecks her eyes out.  Blinded, she is hit by a ten-tonne truck and thrown onto the wayside (such a pity, as the funky, blood-red coat she was sporting, complete with a beautiful, matching fake-fur (I hope!!) collar, was a fine specimen of a garment!!).

The other victim is Bill Atherton, who works with Richard and his new protégé Paul Buher, another one of the devil’s little helpers.  Whilst playing a game of ice-hockey at the Thorn residence with Damien, Mark, Paul, Richard and the lads from the academy, poor old Bill slips through some cracked ice and freezes to death.  Interestingly enough Damien, still unaware of his identity at this stage, can be seen desperately trying to help.  Poor lamb!!  Bill had to die because he opposed Paul’s radical land purchasing schemes in the third world, and also because he posed a threat to Thorn Industries developing and therefore attaining more control and domination in general.

Anyway, back to AFTER Damien knows who he is.  First to cop it is Pasarian, one of the chemical engineers at Thorn Industries.  He’s onto a dodgy scheme by Buher’s henchmen in the third world, who are killing off farmers refusing to sell their land.  He doesn’t know that Buher is behind it all. Damien and his friends go on an educational trip to one of the Thorn plants.  Pasarian is doing a check on some machinery containing a dangerous gas, and gets killed in the process.  Lethal!!  Next to go is Dr Kane, who examines all the boys in the aftermath of the explosion. Damien is the only one not affected AT ALL by the gas, and the Doctor is naturally intrigued by this.  He runs some tests on Damien’s blood after he has been released and gone home, only to reveal that the blood is of a DIFFERENT cell structure, that of the Jackal no less.  Ever more curious, he gets into a glass lift to go and discuss this remarkable information. This, it has to be said, is probably the best death scene of all the Omen films, and definitely my favourite!!  The Doctor is annoyed to find that the lift is going up, as opposed to down as he wants.  It goes to the highest floor, then without warning shoots down at an alarmingly rapid speed. It stops suddenly, and the Doctor is just getting his breath back when part of the shaft wire holding the lift comes flying down through the glass roof and cuts the entirely surprised Doctor in half.  Top!!

Onto the next gory expiration, which is poor old Mark.  This occurs after Charles is sent some material from the archaeological dig.  He finds a letter addressed to Richard from Bugenhagen, and reads it.  Traumatised, he runs over to the Thorn residence and gives Richard the letter.  Mark overhears the whole thing, and the next morning goes out walking in the snow.  Damien follows, and confesses that he IS the Anti-Christ.  He begs Mark to join him in the eternal battle of good against evil, but Mark refuses and is rewarded with a brain haemorrhage.

By now, Richard is beginning to get somewhat suspicious.  He goes off to the site where Yigael’s Wall is being stored on a train, and also to find Charles who has seen the wall and become a quivering wreck as a result.  Richard and Charles go down to see the wall, Charles clutching a crucifix and waiting anxiously.  Just as Richard sees Damien’s face on the wall, Charles is slaughtered when he gets caught on the front of one of the carriages and is brought crashing into the back of another.

Richard heads straight back to Chicago to finish the job and kill Damien as ordained (get it?!!) by Bugenhagen with the Seven Knives of Meggido. Damien is summoned to the Thorn Museum, where the knives are being held, to meet Richard and Ann there. Richard tells Ann about what has happened thus, and she begs him to disregard it all as nonsense and let Damien be.  Richard, quite sensibly, refuses and awaits Damien’s arrival. He finds the daggers in the meantime, and is stunned when Ann stabs him with some of them.  Damien has arrived by now and overhears all the commotion.  As Richard dies, with a look of complete shock registered on his face in the light of his beloved second wife’s revelation of “I’ve always belonged to him”, Ann screams out for Damien.  On hearing this, Damien uses a bit of the old tele-kinetic energy to set the place alight, with Ann still in it, and walks off with a haughty sneer that Kenneth Williams would have killed for. Sirens can be heard on their way to another emergency as Damien emerges, smiling, from the building, military cap cocked at an angle, triumphant, impregnable and completely in control…..

I have to state at this point that I think Jonathan Scott-Taylor as Damien was a fantastic choice by the makers of the first sequel, as he was able to exude evil in a way that would have put any serial killer to shame!!  He made the part his own, and I was really impressed by how well he handled everything.  I’ve always wondered what, if anything, he’s been up to since then. A HUGE talent.

OMEN III:  THE FINAL CONFLICT                                 1981

MAIN PLAYERS:	SAM NEILL	Damien Thorn
	DON GORDON	Harvey Dean
	ROSSANO BRAZZI	Father DeCarlo
	LISA HARROW	Kate Reynolds
	BARNABY HOLM	Peter Reynolds
	MASON ADAMS	President USA
DIRECTED BY:	GRAHAM BAKER
EVIL CREATURES:	ROTTWEILERS (“Devil Dogs”) AGAIN

Damien Thorn is now a grown man of 32, Head of Thorn Industries, and fully aware of his powers and his role in life, which is to restore the Devil as the almighty power over one and all. He is aided in his dastardly aims by his assistant Dean, who knows the whole story.  Damien doesn’t mess about, and starts by disposing of the current American Ambassador to Britain.  The Ambassador calls a press conference after rigging up a suicide bid in his office, and when his secretary (has anyone noticed that she is played by a very young RUBY WAX?  Mad or what?!!) opens his door, a gun attached to some typewriter ribbon tied around the handles is triggered and blows his head off.  Nice!!

So of course, Damien is then summoned to the good old U S of A where the President virtually gets down on his knees and begs Damien to become the next Ambassador. Damien accepts this new and highly coveted position, but only after haggling for a couple of extra “benefits”, in a manner of speaking. But, in the meantime, Damien is acutely aware that the Second Coming of Christ is just around the corner.  The imminent arrival of the holy infant is already having an effect upon Damien’s powers, which are weakening slowly but surely and will deteriorate at a breath-taking rate once the child has actually been born.  Another worry is that the Seven Knives of Meggido have been found in the rubble of the Thorn Museum, which Damien took no trouble in wasting some 20 years before.  They have been sold at an auction, their purpose discovered and then subsequently passed on to an Italian priest, Father DeCarlo, who is determined to ensure that the work of the Lord is done.

He sets up camp in London with a bunch of monk henchmen, each very eager to be the first to deliver the fatal blow to Damien. They follow the Evil One about and each meet a grisly end, including being burnt to a crisp in a TV studio and eaten by a pack of hunting hounds. Lovely!!  Soon, the only crusader left is Father DeCarlo himself, who enlists the help of a reporter who has fallen under Damien’s spell.  Her son has become an apostle of the devil, and tells Damien of every move that Father DeCarlo makes. Meanwhile, Christ is reborn, and Damien starts to feel the pressure. He orders his sidekick Dean to set about terminating the enemy by killing every single baby boy born between a certain set of dates. Dean, very uneasy about such a heinous task, undertakes this request until all but one boy, Dean’s own newborn baby son, are dead.

Damien comes to realise that Dean’s child could very possibly be Christ.  Whilst all this is happening, Father DeCarlo has filled in his reporter friend, Kate Reynolds, of Damien’s true identity.  He hands her the dossier he has built up on Damien, but she is by now besotted with him and ignores the Father’s anguished warnings. It is only when she is forced to face the fact that her own son has spurned her in favour of Damien (but only because he was already one of Damien’s own) that she takes action. She sets Damien up for the final conflict that the title of the film suggests by arranging for Damien to meet “The Christ Child” (actually born among a Gypsy camp as pointed out in the novel, and as the birth was not registered there was no birth certificate, and therefore no information held on record.  Nice one!!).  Dean, the poor man, has already been “taken out”, so to speak, by his wife, who discovered what he had done, and whose child has already been murdered by Damien’s stooges.  Unfortunately for Dean, Damien had ordered him to kill his own baby, and whilst trying to escape the wrath of The Desolate One Dean got hit in the face with a piping hot iron by his missus before he got a chance to tell her that he wanted to flee from Damien, but not before discovering the horrific fate of his son.

Anyway, at the meeting point, an old church ruin of some sort, Father DeCarlo is lying in wait with the last remaining Knife of Meggido, Damien having collected the other 6 after getting shut of the monks.  Father DeCarlo accidentally stabs Kate’s son Peter, who Damien was using as a shield.  He then starts baying for the blood of the “Nazarene”.  Kate, distraught by the needless death of her son, runs at Damien from behind, shrieking with fury, and literally stabs Damien in the back.  Damien, defiant as ever, continues to taunt Christ and then falls in a heap, dead as a doornail.  The image of Christ the adult then rises into the dawn sky, and the eternal battle of good and evil is at an end - for now.  No more Damien.  The last scene is of Kate and Father DeCarlo, carrying the limp body of her dead son, walking away from the scene of the big fight. And that’s it…..

CONCLUSION

So that’s all three films dissected then. I don’t know why I’m so fascinated by them, but I just am.  I’ve watched all of them on a countless number of occasions, and I never tire of or get bored with them. But as I said before, I don’t reckon as much of Omen III as I do of I and II, which are classics as far as I’m concerned. Fans of “The Bill” may have spotted ERIC RICHARD, now better known as Sergeant Bob Cryer, playing the part of the Astronomer’s Technician in III. Surreal or what?!!  Anyway, I digress.  Basically, I think The Omen Trilogy is an incredible set of films, and I love them to bits.

I won’t even waste my breath on Omen IV, which was made sometime in the 1990s and was catastrophically diabolical. It was a COMPLETELY different story from the book (which featured Damien’s child being born after he got Kate the Reporter pregnant), and was not in the least bit entertaining I’m afraid.  I just hope that none of the originals are remade in best Hollywood blockbuster fashion, as that would be SUCH an awful idea.  I don’t think I could watch them if that happened, but I suppose it would depend on who starred in them!!

My Omen Box Set, released in 1996 in commemoration of the opening of the first Omen film in 1976, is one of my most treasured possessions, and I think it was a very good buy!!  Incidentally, the Box Set came out exactly 10 years after I first saw the trilogy on television as an impressionable schoolgirl.  Spooky!!

Okay, so to finally end this huge monologue of mine.  Anyone who hasn’t seen The Omen films should try to do so at the first opportunity, as they’re nothing less than brilliant. Pure fucking GENIUS…..

ANGIE J COOKE née LEWIS 

(Originally written in 1999) 

Manchester, ENGLAND