The Omen (1976)

The Omen features the kind of horror film theme that scares us most — the presence of Satan. In this case, that presence is made all the more creepy because it comes to us in the form of a child. To this day The Omen stands out as one of the more creepy supernatural horror films ever made.

Plot summary for The Omen:
Katherine Thorn (Lee Remick ) is the wife of Robert Thorn (Gregory Peck), a U.S. ambassador. She gives birth to a stillborn baby. To spare his wife the pain of knowing she has lost a child, he substitutes the child for another baby. Time passes, and strange things start to happen. The child’s nanny hangs herself. A priest is accidentally speared to death. Turns out the child is the son of Satan and has been causing all of the havoc.

Memorable scene from The Omen:
There’s something about technological verification of something creepy that makes us scream out like frightened children, and The Omen has one such scene. A photographer is developing photographs of people who have died during the course of the film. As the pictures are developed, we see red lines running through them. Now that’s creepy!

Memorable quote from The Omen:
“Wrong? What could be wrong with our child, Robert? We’re beautiful people, aren’t we?”

Why we love The Omen:
There are many reasons to love The Omen. First, we are afraid of what Damien will do to us if we don’t love the movie. Then, speaking purely as horror film fans, we loved the decapitation scene, the aforementioned impaling of the priest, Damien’s famous tricycle ride, and the bizarre revelation at the gravesite dig.

Frightening Fact:
Director Richard Donner used reverse psychology on young actor Harvey Stephens (Damien Thorn) while filming The Omen’s final scene. Donner told Harvey, “Don’t you dare smile. If you smile, I won’t be your friend.” Of course, the child smiled directly into the camera.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 11th, 2005 at 6:55 pm and is filed under Horror Movies. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.