Sick, sick, sick

"The Omen" is a faithful remake of the 1976 film, and that's a relief; it depends on characters and situations and doesn't go berserk with visuals. In an age of effects run wild, what would a "contemporary" remake look like? No doubt lightning would zap from little Damien's ears, and his mother would not merely topple from a balcony but spin down to the bowels of the Earth.

The story outline is as before: Worried astro-theologians in Vatican City ponder the meaning of comets in the heavens and upheavals on Earth, and an American diplomat and his wife have a baby boy in a Rome hospital. They are told the child has died, and the husband is urged by a sinister doctor to substitute a baby born the same day to an unwed mother. He agrees, keeps this a secret from his wife, and together they raise Damien, of whom it can be said that if he were made of snips and snails and puppy-dog tails, it would be an improvement.

The parents are Robert and Katherine Thorn (Liev Schreiber and Julia Stiles). After his boss' tragic death, the way becomes clear for Robert to become the American ambassador to Great Britain. Since he is the godson of the president, it is all too clear that Damien's path ahead is preordained: He could become president and hasten Armageddon. I suppose there also will be remakes of "Damien: Omen II" (1978) and "Omen III: The Final Conflict" (1981), although after the Final Conflict, "Omen IV: The Awakening" (1991) did not seem urgently required.

The most shocking scene in the 1976 movie was set at Damien's garden party, when his nanny cried out to him from the roof of the ambassador's mansion, jumped off with a rope around her neck and hanged herself. In this remake, when the replacement nanny turns up, a chuckle runs through the audience: She is Mrs. Baylock, played by Mia Farrow, who as Rosemary also had a baby not destined to become a Gerber's model.

Enough of the plot. Let us consider instead the genre of theological sensationalism. I've observed before that when it comes to dealing with demons and suchlike, Roman Catholics have the market cornered. Preachers of other faiths can foam and foment all they want about satanic cults, but when it comes to knowing the ground rules and reading ominous signs, what you want at the bedside is a priest who knows his way around an exorcism.

"The Omen" begins in the Vatican Observatory, where the heavens are seen to fulfill prophecy by placing a star above Rome on the night of Damien's birth, just as there was a star above Bethlehem when Jesus was born. That the Antichrist gets his own star makes you wonder who's running the heavens, but never mind.

The pope is informed, and his advisers add up the signs: The Jews have returned to the land of Zion, there are tumults of the earth and sea, and in a parallel I think needs a lot of looking into, the Common Market is an ominous portent. The film opens with a montage of such pre-apocalyptic events as the collapsing Trade Center, Hurricane Katrina and the 2004 tsunami; perhaps the haste with which "The Omen" incorporates real-life tragedy into a horror movie is also a sign that the end is near.