The Omen (DVD)
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The Omen remake polarized fans of the original — some appreciated director John Moore's faithfulness to the source material and adding some visual embellishments of his own, while others felt his version was miscast and too stylized. For those who didn't see the 1976 version, the consensus was generally good.
Personally, I liked the movie (check out Horror.com's original theatrical release review), and my opinion hasn't changed upon second viewing on DVD. It's a solid thriller with some very nice flourishes and good performances.
As for the additional release material on the disc, it's well-thought out, providing a variety of ghoulish goodies:
Abby Road Sessions — The music for The Omen was composed by Marco Beltrami, a student of the original film's composer (Jerry Goldsmith). While there is some influence, the 2006 soundtrack is quite a bit different; it's more suspense/thriller than religious/horror. It's interesting to see how the maestro worked closely with the film's director on deciding how to create character themes and scene-by-scene musical montages. The music was recorded at the famous Abbey Road Studios, and even though
Commentary — Director Moore, producer Glenn Williamson and editor Dan Zimmerman are on hand for the yak track. Not the most entertaining as far as anecdotes go (I like it when actors are there to add the less-technical perspective to these things), but after they warm up they do offer some interesting insights about working on the production which spanned the globe from Italy to Ireland to Eastern Europe.
Deleted Scenes — Ordinarily, I think less is more, but in the case of The Omen I rather liked the more violent ending, the much more gory decapitation, and the violent impaling sequence. I liked the deleted scenes quite a bit, but sadly they're not incorporated into the film in any way. An optional unrated version would have been nice.
Omen-isms — This is not your standard "behind the scenes" sunshine and roses look at how much fun it is to make a movie and kissy-kissy "look at how much we love each other" EPK dreck. It's a realistic, unflinching observation of the day-to-day trials, tribulations and triumphs of making a big-budget film. There's a lot at stake and tempers flare, people get tired, some make mistakes, actors take chances, and things go wrong. But things go right, too — on the flipside, we believe it's genuine when we see the camaraderie, the compliments and the celebration. This very in-depth featurette covers The Omen from pre-production through its record-breaking Tuesday opening day.
Revelation 666 — You may have seen some of this doomsday-themed doc played on TV at the time of the film's theatrical release, but this is a longer, more in-depth version with added speakers and some other end-of-world spookers sure to have paranoid types barring their windows and battening down the bomb-shelter.
All in all, The Omen DVD is well worth the price of purchase — even if it's a bit more than $6.66.
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Reviewed by Staci Layne Wilson