For those of you keeping tabs on the slew of remakes invading Hollywood, you can cross another one off your list. "The Omen"--originally released in 1976 and directed by Richard Donner--was a film I found to be quite overblown, the story and characterizations stretched a little too thin to do justice to the idea behind it. Now, thirty years later, we have John Moore's remake. I had my doubts going into the theater because I knew it was reinterpreting something that wasn't very good to begin with. But for whatever reason, this new version works. At least, it works for me. At first I couldn't understand why; this is a very faithful adaptation of a baffling film, and because of that, I expected this to be equally as disappointing.

I have to admit that it was an entertaining reinterpretation. Unfortunately, the story had nothing to do with why I liked it; I think it had more to do with the film's style. It relied on pure atmosphere and mood to convey the impending terror that occurs. There are many moments encased in shadow, most of which are only lit by the occasional flash of lightening. We also get to look inside an open grave in Rome, a scene accentuated by snowy, dismally gray weather. Most importantly, we get subtle yet significant character expressions, most of which come from Damien (Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick), the young but not innocent Devil incarnate. There's a moment when he's in a dimly lit kitchen fixing himself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. When his mother, Katherine (Julia Stiles), enters the room, he gives her one of the creepiest stares I've ever seen a child give.

It also helped that most of the famous scenes from the original were brought back. These include Katherine falling from the upstairs landing, a priest getting impaled, and a nanny who inexplicably hangs herself. ("It's all for you, Damien!" she shouts before jumping from the roof of the Thorns' sprawling London estate. No matter how hard I try, I still can't figure out why she did it or exactly what was all for him.) Even some of Jerry Goldsmith's Oscar winning score finds its way into the remake. I suppose those of you devoted to the original film will find this troublesome, maybe even blasphemous (pardon the pun). When it comes to remakes, there's always been a fine line between a genuine update and an unimaginative rehash. Whether or not "The Omen" actually crosses that line is open for debate.

That's because, despite the new cast and the impressive cinematography, the basic story is exactly the same. It beings when U.S. ambassador to Italy Robert Thorn (Liev Schreiber) arrives at the hospital to be by his pregnant wife's side (apparently, she went into a rather difficult labor). He runs into Father Spiletto (Giovanni Lombardo Radice) when he arrives, and the priest gives him the bad news: the baby did not survive the delivery and Katherine will most likely never again be able to bear children. This is more than just devastating for Robert, it also puts extra pressure on him; Katherine still doesn't know what's happened, and now, he has to be the one to tell her. But Spiletto gives him another option. Another child was born that day, a boy whose mother tragically died during childbirth. As an added bonus, he has no other living family members. (Does the word "convenient" come to mind?) Robert decides to bring the boy to his wife and tell her that they have a beautiful new son who they name Damien.

Everything goes smoothly for the family over the next five or so years. Then things start to go wrong when Robert's colleague--Ambassador Steven Haines (Marshall Cup)--is killed in an accident involving a leaking gas truck and a discarded cigarette (I'm sure you can imagine what happens). But life goes on, and the Thorns eventually move from Italy to London, taking residence in an obscenely large gothic mansion. For a short while, things continue to go smoothly. Then comes Damien's birthday, an almost gala event that brings scores of children and even larger scores of photographers. It also happens to be the same day when Damien's young nanny (Amy Huck) performs her suicidal stunt.

And that's when everything starts to go downhill. The search for a new nanny yields the unexpected finding of Mrs. Baylock (Mia Farrow), a seemingly friendly but somehow sinister woman who takes an uncomfortable liking to Damien. She also defies the authority of his parents, especially when it comes to keeping a mean spirited stray dog in the house. Strangely enough, this behavior made her a confusing character. I was bothered by the fact that I never really got a chance to know her; she just appears out of nowhere, and even though we know what her real intentions are, we don't know why she has them. I can only speculate that she belongs to some kind of opposing factor that sent her to the Thorns.

Still, she does add a much-needed dose of tension into the story (especially in the scene when she hand feeds Damien strawberries; talk about tense). But Mrs. Baylock is only the start of the family's problems. Katherine eventually beings to notice certain things about Damien, things that other children don't seem to have to deal with. For one, she realizes that he's never once gotten sick, despite having a typically non-sterile childhood. But more importantly, he's become increasingly detached, always walking around with a blank expression and dark circles under his eyes. When she starts to have nightmares relating to her son, she knows for sure that something is wrong with him.

Robert is noticing some strange things, as well. At one point, he runs into Father Brennan (Pete Postlethwaite), a man who seems desperate to warn him about his son. Bluntly put, he believes Damien to be the son of the Devil, and he makes his case by quoting lyrical Bible passages. As you might expect, Robert is initially unwilling to listen to what Brennan has to say, even when he insists that Katherine is in danger. Only when she takes her bad fall does Robert begin to see the pieces falling into place. It's clear, even to Keith Jennings (David Thewlis), a mysterious photographer who sees the clues in his own pictures. Evil may in fact be living among us in the form of a young boy, and if there's to be any hope of saving humanity, his body and soul have to be destroyed.

Thus begins a borderline obsessive mission, one that leads Robert and Keith from London to Rome and eventually to Isreal. Robert continually questions his own state of mind along the way, torn between believing his son is the Antichrist and the fact that he may be plotting the murder of an innocent young boy (even though we know the truth). In this sense, the writer is obviously skilled in depicting emotional turmoil. But despite the fact that I found the film's strong emotional core enticing, I think what most attracted me to it was its ad campaign (which, I realize, is not exactly meaningful).

I remember seeing the first teaser trailer for it back in the spring, one of the creepiest, tensest teasers I've ever seen. It started with a shot of a dog sitting on a rusty-looking playground carousel. Then the camera slowly pans over to a young boy sitting on a swing set. At the end of the shot, he looks directly into the camera with a simple yet terrifying gaze in his eyes. I also remember seeing plenty of billboards for it. Like the teaser, none of them had the film's title; they only had the date (6-6-06, the cleverness of which faded a long time ago) and a couple of taglines (such as "You have been warned," and "The signs are all around us"). It's probably not a good thing when a film's ads are more impressive than the film itself. I liked this movie at the most superficial level, and because of that I can only recommend it for the way it looks, not for the story it tells.

- Chris Pandolfi

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