When people reflect back on the major horror successes of the 1970s, they pinpoint a variety of key titles.
THE EXORCIST, THE TEXAS CHAIN SAW MASSACRE, HALLOWEEN for example.
In 1976, a low-budget offering proved that it could transcend expectations thanks in part to a major media campaign to rival that of the blockbuster 1975 offering JAWS, quite astounding considering the budget it was made on.
It is also indirectly responsible for a cinematic revolution, given that the studio it was produced by (Twentieth Century Fox) was able to use some of the profits to help finance another low-budget, seemingly independent film being made the year of its’ release by the name of STAR WARS….
Richard Donner’s THE OMEN is still a template for effective and suspenseful cinematic horror, with some excellent physical, in-camera moments and a little bit of persuasion from the director who, with editor Stuart Baird and Jerry Goldsmith (who won his only Academy Award for the score), managed to make us believe that the Devil himself was incarnated in a little, seemingly innocent boy called Damien (Harvey Stephens)
American Diplomat Robert Thorn (Gregory Peck) is devastated to learn of his wife Katherine (Lee Remick) miscarrying her latest pregnancy. At the advice of Father Spiletto (Martin Benson, GOLDFINGER), he adopts a child who was born at the same time his own died. Named Damien, the child does initially become a source of joy.
Five years later, Thorn has become US Ambassador to Great Britain, but at Damien’s fifth birthday part, a rather extravagant affair, their current nanny hangs herself by jumping from the ledge of the building. In place of her, Mrs. Baylock (Billie Whitelaw) turns up and swears to Damien that she ‘will protect thee’.
A priest (Patrick Troughton, one of the earliest DR. WHOs) warns Thorn of the child’s power, whilst a photographer, Keith Jennings (David Warner) notices strange blemishes on pictures he takes of the nanny and the priest during Damien’s birthday party celebration.
Before long, the dark reality begins to impose on the Thorns – and more mystery evolves….
There are so many iconic moments in this now-classic horror film and it is the perfect tonic for audience manipulation, which was made at Shepperton Studios (the scene early on in the hospital is actually shot in the reception area of a building within a studios, pointed out by Baird and Donner in the hugely-entertaining audio commentary on the DVD)
If you haven’t seen it, best to rent or stream it and find out for yourself how great it is in the same way I did when I first saw it in the early 1980s….