The Omen

When watching a film like The Omen (2006), I can't help but wonder why anyone in their right mind would name their kid Damien. To me no name screams more "I am the antichrist" than the name Damien. If I were going to bring the child of the devil into the world I'd give him a name that nobody would ever think to doubt. I'd name the kid Jesus Satankiller. Who would ever think that Jesus Satankiller was a bad guy? His last name is Satankiller. His first name is Jesus. Now that would be a name to fool mankind.

This is probably the case because I know of and have seen the original The Omen (1976). Still beyond having seen it years ago, I don't recall much of the film. The film doesn't try very hard you know that Damien is the devil's son pretty much from the start and the film pretty much follows a silly formula. There are some truly ludicrous moments such as when a paparrazzi played by David Thewlis interprets a poem to mean Damien's rise from the sea means politics. I couldn't help myself from laughing at how absurd the interpretation was.

The acting in this film is entirely wooden, which is really a shame because there is some amazing talent in this film. Pete Postlehtwaite, David Thewlis and Liev Schreiber in their own right are all excellent actors here reduced to mere shells of characters. And then there is Michael Gambon, alas, never was there a more blatant waste of talent than him in this film.

For most of the film I thought how much better it would have been if someone had made the Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaimon book "Good Omens" into a movie. That was a very funny book about the son of the devil being misplaced in a mix up and the search for him by the demon responsible and the angel sent to prevent him. In the end that was what I was left with. The film would have been better if it had not been a remake but an adaptation of a recent book. Of course that would be totally opposite of Hollywood logic.