Omen (Blu-ray) (1976)

"A gruesome guilty pleasure horror film...  Bob Bloom, Journal and Courier
"A truly frightening chiller. A definite classic of the horror genre.  Chuck O'Leary, FulvueDrive-In.com
"...a good, tight, little horror shocker and one of the best of the apocalyptic genre.  John J. Puccio, DVD Town
"Creepy horror classic thats just plain fun to watch.  Scott Weinberg, eFilmCritic.com
"...a really fun horror film, filled with joyously manipulative undertones of Christian fear...  Ted Prigge, Rec.Arts.Movies.Reviews

Editor's Note A staid American ambassador (Peck) and his wife are heartbroken when their child is stillborn, but their heartbreak is only beginning when they adopt an orphan. As the boy grows, disaster surrounds him, beginning with the suicide of his nanny, and as the bodies pile up, his horrified father begins to believe that the boy is evil incarnate and must be destroyed. The unique climax paved the way for two popular sequels, "Damien - Omen II" and "Final Conflict."

	Billie Whitelaw
	Gregory Peck
	Tommy Duggan
	Robert Rietty
	Harvey Stephens
	Sheila Raynor
	Martin Benson
	Roy Boyd
	David Warner
	Robert McLeod
	Patrick Troughton
	Lee Remick
	Nicholas Campbell
	Leo McKern
	Nancy Manningham
	Holly Palance
	John Stride
	Gilbert Taylor - Director of Photography
	Jerry Goldsmith - Composer
	David Seltzer - Screenwriter
	John Richardson - Special Effects
	Stuart Baird - Editor
	Harvey Bernhard - Producer
	Carmen Dillon - Production Designer
	Richard Donner - Director

American ambassador Robert Thorn and his lovingly dedicated wife are expecting a child. But when the infant is stillborn a mysterious Italian priest convinces the diplomat to clandestinely adopt another of the hospital's newborn children. Thorn takes the priest's advice without telling his wife about their loss. After five short happy years together, things start to go wrong: the family's au pair commits suicide, Father Brennan warns Robert about the child's strange nature, and an archaeologist tries to convince ambassador Thorn that the boy is the anti-Christ incarnate. Ultimate DVD
5 stars out of 5 -- "Donner's film deftly delves into Christian mythology, constructing a fantastically tall and creepy tale..." 07/01/2006 p.86

FilmCritic.com 6 of 10
The Omen is not as serious a movie as it appears. Coming to the modern audience as the infant in a Holy trinity of satanic, apocalyptic horror films, including The Exorcist and Rosemary's Baby, The Omen arrives leaden with reputation and expectation. Its story is renowned, its sequences remembered, and its delicious score is an iconic pop-cultural phenomenon. On the surface of things, Richard Donner's film matches its Trinitarian peers shock for shock. However, as little Damian proves, not everything is as it seems. Though garbed in the accoutrements of its satanic predecessors, it is at its core a story of gross implausibility and squandered potential, a schlocky piece of fluff shot and cut with unwarranted earnestness. When poked and prodded, when the hair is cut away, the film is essentially a pretty good bad movie...Donner directs all of this action with a master's handle. Every moment of terror, every death, hits hard with suddenness and a certain ingenuity. The nanny suicide is a particularly well orchestrated ballet of close-ups, crazed eyes, and well, leaping nannies. Donner attacks the ears with barking animals and a ludicrous yet effective score courtesy of Jerry Goldsmith. Cloying Hallmarkish pianos follow the family around their English manor before harps, trumpets, and Latinized choirs join in to herald the film's sporadic explosions of violence. - Joel Meares

Chicago Sun-Times 7 of 10
Once was that Catholic priests in the movies were played by Bing Crosby and Spencer Tracey and went about dispensing folksy wisdom, halftime pep talks and pats on the back. Times have so changed, alas, that these days movie priests are almost inevitably engaged in titanic confrontations with the forces of darkness. Jason Miller and Max von Sydow were killed in their efforts to drive the evil spirit from poor Linda Blair in "The Exorcist," and now here's another priest, in "The Omen; " wickedly substituting the spawn of Satan for the newborn son of Gregory Peck and Lee Remick..."The Omen" takes all of this terribly seriously, as befits the genre that gave us "Rosemary's Baby" and "The Exorcist." What Jesus was to the 1950s movie epic, the devil is to the 1970s, and so all of this material is approached with the greatest solemnity, not only in the performances but also in the photography, the music and the very looks on people's faces...As long as movies like "The Omen" are merely scaring us, they're fun in a portentous sort of way. But when they get thoughtful . . . well, how about the movie's interpretation of the Biblical prophecy that the son of Satan will return when the Jews return to Zion, a comet is seen in the sky, and the Roman Empire rises again. Right enough with the first two, the characters agree. But -- the Roman Empire? - Roger Ebert