The Omen Trilogy Box Set



Overall | The Omen | Damien: Omen II | Omen III: The Final Conflict


    The Omen Trilogy boxed set is a collection of the three films that are considered canon in the story started in 1976 by The Omen, presented in a gatefold with the same carbon slip cover as was used for the limited editions of Fight Club and The Rocky Horror Picture Show. In contrast to a lot of other boxed sets of this variety, the two sequels, Damien: Omen II and Omen III: The Final Conflict, are not available separately. This is something of a nuisance, as I would have preferred to buy them in Transparent Amarays, but the $99.95 price point of this boxed set represents a saving of about $10.90 compared to the presumed cost of buying all three films separately.

    In contrast to the Region 1 version, the frankly appalling telemovie Omen IV: The Awakening is not available in the Region 4 version of this boxed set. If you decide that you must buy this telemovie (which is not available separately even in Region 1), you're really only buying an expensive coaster, because said film is bad enough to make a grown man cry profusely. Overall, if you're looking for a classic horror saga with excellent presentation, then The Omen Trilogy Boxed Set is difficult to ignore. Granted, the films are incredibly dated, and the two sequels have more plot holes than you can shake a lengthy cylindrical object at, but the horror fan is in for a real treat with this boxed set. Grab a box of popcorn, your favourite religious trinkets, turn the lights out completely, and be prepared for horror films that work more on the psychological level than the visual one.
 

Overall Box Set Ratings (out of 5)

 
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The Omen

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Details At A Glance

General
Extras
Category Horror Main Menu Introduction
Main Menu Audio & Animation
Audio Commentary - Richard Donner (Director) & Stuart Baird (Editor)
Featurette - 666: The Omen Revealed
Featurette - Curse Or Coincidence
Featurette - Jerry Goldsmith on The Omen Score
Theatrical Trailer
Rating r.gif (1169 bytes)
Year Released 1976
Running Time 106:26 Minutes
RSDL/Flipper RSDL (49:33)
Cast & Crew
Start Up Menu
Region 2,4 Director Richard Donner
Studio
Distributor
Fox.gif (4090 bytes)
Fox Home Entertainment
Starring Gregory Peck
Lee Remick
David Warner
Billie Whitelaw
Harvey Stephens
Patrick Troughton
Case Transparent Amaray
RPI Individual Disc - $36.95
Boxed Set - $99.95
Music Jerry Goldsmith

 
 
Video
Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame None English (Dolby Digital 2.0 , 192Kb/s)
English Audio Commentary (Dolby Digital 2.0 mono, 96Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio 2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
16x9Yes.jpg (4536 bytes)
Original Aspect Ratio 2.35:1
Miscellaneous
Macrovision Yes Smoking No
Subtitles Czech
Danish
English for the Hearing Impaired
Finnish
Hebrew
Hungarian
Icelandic
Norwegian
Polish
Portuguese
Swedish
Annoying Product Placement Yes
Action In or After Credits No

Plot Synopsis

    The Omen, Richard Donner's treatment of the prophecy foretold in the Book of Revelations, is one of the most interesting and most talked-about horror movies in history, with numerous imitations coming out of the woodpile every so often.

    The story begins on the sixth of June, at the hour of six in the morning, in the year 1966, with Robert Thorn (Gregory Peck), an industrial mogul, travelling to the local hospital where his wife, Katherine (Lee Remick), is about to give birth. Unfortunately, the delivery does not go at all well, with Katherine passing out during labour, and the baby being stillborn, at least according to the doctor. Father Spiletto (Martin Benson) comes to Robert, stating that another baby has been born whose mother did not survive the birth, and he suggests the idea that Robert raise the young orphan as his own son, with Katherine none the wiser. Shortly thereafter, Robert Thorn accepts the position of ambassador to England, requiring him to move to London, which he does in earnest (as I would do if I had the money he is portrayed as having).

    All goes well for a while, with the young Damien (Harvey Stephens, who has never made a film since) slotting nicely into place as the heir to the massive Thorn empire. However, things take a turn for the ugly when the Thorns hire a young nanny (Holly Palance) to assist in caring for Damien, which ends with the nanny proceeding to kill herself at Damien's fifth birthday party. She is soon replaced by a much more creepy, elder nanny known as Missus Baylock (Billie Whitelaw), who is enough of a cow (figuratively, I mean) to bring out the beast lurking within any male child. As animals also begin reacting unfavourably to Damien, Robert is contacted by the slightly unhinged Father Brennan (Patrick Troughton), who warns that Damien is the Antichrist and that Robert should seek out the archaeologist priest called Bugenhagen (Leo McKern, who is uncredited in both of the Omen films he appears in). At first, Robert dismisses Brennan's warnings, but  shots taken by a photographer named Jennings (David Warner in a show-stealing performance) reveal awful warnings that precipitate some extremely nasty deaths. These photographs, among other things, help convince Robert that the warnings he originally dismissed as lunacy are actually the truth, and he sets to find out more about Damien's natural parents.

    I'll be brutally honest with you and tell you that this film has not aged as well as it would have with a tighter script and some better acting. David Warner steals the show because he plays his role absolutely straight, with the kind of sincerity that I normally only deliver when I scream abuse at the elders of one of those sects you hear about on current affairs shows. He also gets decapitated from several angles in one of the most sadistic death scenes ever committed to celluloid, even comparing well to those that feature eleven years later in both the theatrical and uncensored versions of RoboCop. Perhaps the most interesting quote of all about the film, however, is that attributed to screenwriter Brian Seltzer: "I did it strictly for the money. I was flat broke. What does frighten me is how many people actually believe all this silliness."

Transfer Quality

Video

    Twenty-five years is a long time for a film, especially one that was produced in the days when home video was still well over the horizon. With that in mind, the transfer we have here can best be described as good, but not great.

    The transfer is presented in the original aspect ratio of 2.35:1, and it is 16x9 Enhanced.

    The transfer is very sharp most of the time, but there seems to be a definite mid-seventies haze in a lot of the shots. The shadow detail ranges from poor to average, with a lot of the night-time shots being just barely clear enough to make out what is supposed to be happening. Low-level noise is not a problem, but film grain is occasionally intrusive, especially during a close-up of a gun muzzle at 102:10.

    The colours in the picture are always very dull and muted, with even the outdoor environments seeming to have little or no life to them. This is more a fault of the methods by which the film was photographed, rather than the transfer. One specific artefact occurred at 35:23, when a trail of colour bleeding extended up from the top of one man's hat. I'm hoping that this was merely a fault of the source material, because it is quite unusual to see colours extend this far past their normal position on DVD-Video.

    MPEG artefacts are not a problem at all for this transfer. Film-to-video artefacts, however, consisted of frequent aliasing. While the aliasing was mostly quite minor, there were the occasional big ones such as at 37:18, which was mildly distracting. Film artefacts were slightly problematic during the end sequence, with vertical scratches making frequent appearances from 103:49 onwards, but the rest of the film is remarkably clean where film artefacts are concerned.

    This disc is RSDL formatted, with the layer change taking place during Chapter 10, at 49:33. The pause is very brief, and the location could not be better in light of that.

Audio

    There are two soundtracks included on this DVD, which makes a nice change from having a disc overloaded with dubs that I'd never listen to in their entirety, if I listen to them at all. The first soundtrack is the original English dialogue in Dolby Digital 2.0 with surround-encoding and a bitrate of 192 kilobits per second. The second soundtrack is an English audio commentary in Dolby Digital 2.0 mono, with a bitrate of 96 kilobits per second. I listened to both of these soundtracks.

    The dialogue is mostly clear and easy to understand, although there were some utterances at times that were a little difficult to make out. This is probably a fault with the original recording techniques, and it isn't as though the words spoken at these times were particularly important or emphasized, anyway. Some of the dialogue is spoken in Italian, but it is pretty easy to guess what these lines mean from their context. There were no discernible problems with audio sync.

    The music in this film is credited to Jerry Goldsmith, and it makes a great lesson in how to overstate a theme to the point where even a simple one sounds like a deathly crescendo. Much of the score consists of a bold theme on piano and strings, with a huge choir repeating a few words in Latin, such that they were just begging for the hilarious send-up they received in one episode of South Park. I simply can't listen to these choir movements without the phrase "Cheesy Poofs" coming to mind at the end of every three Latin words, and I doubt that anyone else who has seen that episode of South Park will be able to, either. All things considered, the score is quite effective at its aims.

    The surround channels are occasionally used to support the music and a handful of sound effects, such as the wheels of a tricycle. Considering that the film was originally presented in mono, this is not terribly surprising, but it does make the soundtrack somewhat less immersive than one could expect from a film of this ilk. One could be forgiven for thinking that the surrounds decided to go and have a cup of coffee during most of the film, although most of the film doesn't really have much for the surrounds to get worked up about, anyway. The subwoofer was not particularly used during this film, either, only taking the occasional redirected signal during such moments as the ringing of bells, the infamous beheading, or the graveyard sequence.

Extras

    A modest, but interesting collection of extras can be found on this disc.

Menu

    The menu features an excellently themed introduction, some excellent animation, a piece of the score music in Dolby Digital 2.0, and 16x9 Enhancement.

Audio Commentary - Richard Donner (Director) & Stuart Baird (Editor)

    Although the opening of this commentary didn't give me much hope, Richard Donner and Stuart Baird provide an interesting insight into how The Omen was made, once they settle in and speak more coherently. Every detail behind the production, including the lengths that had to be gone to in order to achieve the special effects, is laid bare for the viewer to think about. My personal favourite is the discussion of the scene in the graveyard, during which both participants state that films need to get back to telling stories rather than bombarding the viewer in special effects, among other things.

Featurette - 666: The Omen Revealed

    This is an excellent example of a documentary that reveals a lot about the making of The Omen, with plenty of insight on offer from people who worked behind the camera. Clocking in at forty-six minutes and seventeen seconds, this featurette is presented Full Frame with footage from the film in the ratio of 2.35:1 and Dolby Digital 2.0 sound. It is not 16x9 Enhanced. The lack of captions makes it hard to determine exactly who is speaking at what time, but the featurette is otherwise very interesting.

Featurette - Curse Or Coincidence

   Clocking in at six minutes and twenty-two seconds, this featurette is also presented Full Frame with footage from the film in the ratio of 2.35:1 and Dolby Digital 2.0 sound. This featurette briefly explores the bizarre incidents that occurred on the set during principal photography. It's a mildly interesting piece of film trivia, but not really much more.

Featurette - Jerry Goldsmith on The Omen Score

   This option takes the viewer to a sub-menu with four separate featurettes, totalling seventeen minutes and forty-six seconds, covering various aspects of The Omen's score music. In order, these featurettes are Love Theme, Damien To Church, Dog Attack, and 666 And Mrs. Baylock. The option to play all of these featurettes in sequence is also included in this menu. Each featurette features Full Frame footage of composer Jerry Goldsmith talking about the artistic considerations that influenced the score music, with 2.35:1 footage from the film. The audio is presented in Dolby Digital 2.0, and the featurette is not 16x9 Enhanced.

Theatrical Trailer

    Presented Full Frame with Dolby Digital 2.0 sound, this two-minute and twenty-second trailer almost succeeds in misleading the viewer into thinking that the film is a comedy. The picture quality is almost bad enough to qualify as a joke, but the sound quality is just fine.

Censorship

    As far as we can determine, there are no specific censorship issues with this title.

R4 vs R1

    The two versions of this disc appear to be fundamentally identical. It is worth noting that, as is the case with Region 4, the Region 1 version of this disc is either available separately or as part of a boxed set. The boxed set in Region 1 also contains Omen IV: The Awakening, but those who have seen this telemovie will know that the fact we miss out on this disc is a blessing, not a curse.

Summary

    The Omen is one of the most interesting horror films of the Twentieth century.

    The video transfer is average.

    The audio transfer is average.

    The extras are interesting.
 
 

Ratings (out of 5)

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Overall sg.gif (100 bytes)sg.gif (100 bytes)sg.gif (100 bytes)sgh.gif (874 bytes)

 © Dean McIntosh (111)
May 8, 2001.

Review Equipment
   
DVD Toshiba SD-2109, using S-video output
Display Samsung CS-823AMF (80 cm) in 16:9 and 4:3 modes, calibrated using the NTSC DVD version of Video Essentials.
Audio Decoder Built In (Amplifier)
Amplification Sony STR-DE835, calibrated using the NTSC DVD version of Video Essentials.
Speakers Yamaha NS-45 Front Speakers, Yamaha NS-90 Rear Speakers, Yamaha NS-C120 Centre Speaker, JBL Digital 10 Active Subwoofer



Overall | The Omen | Damien: Omen II | Omen III: The Final Conflict

Damien: Omen II

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Details At A Glance

General
Extras
Category Horror Audio Commentary - Harvey Bernhard (Producer/Writer)
Theatrical Trailer
Trailer - The Omen
Trailer - Omen III: The Final Conflict
Rating m.gif (1166 bytes)
Year Released 1978
Running Time 102:29 Minutes
RSDL/Flipper RSDL (56:53)
Cast & Crew
Start Up Menu
Region 2,4 Director Don Taylor
Studio
Distributor
Fox.gif (4090 bytes)
Fox Home Entertainment
Starring William Holden
Lee Grant
Jonathan Scott-Taylor
Robert Foxworth
Nicholas Pryor
Lew Ayres
Case Gatefold
RPI Boxed Set - $99.95 Music Jerry Goldsmith
 
Video
Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame None English (Dolby Digital 2.0 , 192Kb/s)
English Audio Commentary (Dolby Digital 2.0 , 96Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio 2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
16x9Yes.jpg (4536 bytes)
Original Aspect Ratio 2.35:1
Miscellaneous
Macrovision Yes Smoking Yes, occasionally
Subtitles Czech
Danish
English for the Hearing Impaired
Finnish
Hebrew
Hungarian
Icelandic
Norwegian
Polish
Portuguese
Swedish
Annoying Product Placement Yes, mildly
Action In or After Credits No

Plot Synopsis

    Some of my comments about the quality of the story on offer in the original Omen couldn't be published for fear of offending someone out there, so I am going to tread a little lightly with this first sequel. The reasons for this are simple enough: while the original film was basically a lot of nonsense redeemed by some stellar acting and a tight script, Damien: Omen II is not such an artistic triumph. The decision to green-light the sequel was not nearly as much an artistic one as was the case with the original, but rather a simple case of favourable bean-counting. Omen director Richard Donner was busy working on the first Superman film, however, and in all probability had no interest in making this sequel, which one can hardly blame him for.

    Damien: Omen II picks up just after the death of industrial mogul Robert Thorn, with the archaeologist Bugenhagen (Leo McKern) meeting with a man named Michael (Ian Hendry). Bugenhagen shows Michael a newspaper article in which the face of the young Damien Thorn is prominently featured, claiming that the five-year-old in the newspaper article is the Antichrist. Michael, naturally, is rather sceptical while Bugenhagen gives him a case containing the seven daggers of Meggido and a letter explaining Damien's true origins, so Bugenhagen insists that Michael come with him to see Yigael's wall, a relic that was painted by the saint Yigael when he had visions of what the Antichrist would look like. Just as Michael gets to see that Bugenhagen is not having a lend of him, and that Damien is indeed the Antichrist, the tunnel begins to cave in on them, and they are buried alive.

    The film then fast-forwards seven years in order to catch up with an adolescent Damien Thorn (Jonathan Scott-Taylor), who is now living with the late Robert Thorn's brother, Richard (William Holden), Richard's second wife Ann (Lee Grant), and his son Mark (Lucas Donat). Damien and Mark are about to leave for military school while Richard's sister, Marion (Sylvia Sydney) has come for a visit. Marion is suspicious of Damien and believes him to be a bad influence upon Mark, so she demands that Richard take the boys out of the military academy they attend and place them in separate schools, or else she will donate her share of the Thorn empire to charity. As Ann and Richard decide they no longer want her around, Marion is visited in the night by a raven that watches as she has a heart attack and dies. This sets one interesting trend in Damien: Omen II with regards to the people who investigate the title character's true origins, in that anyone who discovers or talks about them with another character dies within five minutes.

    Meanwhile, at the Davidson Military Academy, anti-Thorn sentiment runs high because of the family's almost royal-like reputation there, and Damien initially reacts to this with some displays of his knowledge and power. A sergeant at the academy known only as Neff (Lance Henriksen) takes Damien aside and tells him to consult the Book of Revelation in order to discover why corpses pile up around him. Two questions are raised by this particular tangent, with the first being what to make of all the moments in the original Omen where the five-year-old Damien seemed to have a somewhat instinctive knowledge of his true heritage. The second question is why the idea of Damien struggling to come to terms with his position as the AntiChrist could not have been explored with a little more depth, rather than starting and stopping with his screams of "why me?" at the evening sky.

     However, we're getting a little ahead of ourselves on that one, as the five-minutes-after-blabbing death trend is kept up by a journalist by the name of Joan Hart (Elizabeth Shepherd), who happens to be an old colleague of Jennings, the photographer who was memorably decapitated in the original film. Within minutes of trying to warn Richard and Ann, Joan glimpses Damien's face, and is shocked to discover that it perfectly resembles one of those painted on Yigael's wall. She is then promptly eliminated by the pet raven, and a very large truck that seems rather out-of-place upon a deserted highway. Meanwhile, after more corpses pile up around Damien, Richard starts to grow suspicious of who Damien really is, and does some investigating of his own. This is where I'll leave the plot summary so you can make up your own mind about whether or not this sequel represents an adequate continuation of the story. If I could sum up the plot quality in one sentence, it would be something like: I quite enjoy Damien: Omen II, others don't, so let's dive right in.

Transfer Quality

Video

    The original Omen was set back slightly by a transfer that showed a lot of the film's age, thanks in part to troublesome colour and a few too many instances of aliasing. Damien: Omen II boasts a transfer that is still dated in appearance, but is improved where sharpness and fidelity to the original film is concerned.

    The transfer is presented in the original aspect ratio of 2.35:1, and is 16x9 Enhanced.

    The transfer is very sharp - not quite as sharp as some contemporary transfers, but sharp enough to impress anyone who is familiar with what other formats can do to films of this age. The shadow detail is just a little tiny bit better than that of the previous film, but still not particularly good because of the film stocks that were used in shooting. There is no low-level noise, and the transfer is less grainy in appearance than is the case with the previous film.

    The colour saturation of this transfer is pretty muted and dull, in at least the same way that most films from around this era are. The only problems I noted with regard to colour were some frames late in the film that took on a slightly yellow tinge compared to the other frames. This effect was only found during a couple of seconds in the film, and served to remind me that the colour saturation could have been a lot worse considering the film's age.

    MPEG artefacts were not a problem in this transfer, with the video material having plenty of space to breathe. This might explain the increase in sharpness that this transfer of Damien: Omen II exhibits over its predecessor, which was compressed just a couple of notches more tightly in order to accommodate a few more extras. Film-to-video artefacts consisted of some aliasing, which was usually quite minor and inconspicuous in the overall picture. However, I did note three quite large aliasing artefacts; at 31:45 on the steps in front of the Thorn Museum; at 60:01 during a panning shot towards the entrance of a Thorn-owned factory; and finally at the same entrance to the Thorn Museum at 71:04. These aliasing artefacts were more distracting than the others, but more tolerable because they weren't there for very long. Film artefacts consisted of some nicks and scratches on the picture that were acceptable within the limits of a twenty-two year old film.

    This disc is RSDL formatted, with the layer change taking place in the middle of Chapter 10, during the bugle music at 56:53. This placement is a little suspect, as it is quite conspicuous in comparison to some points a matter of minutes earlier or later that the layer change could have been placed.

Audio

    Just as the video transfer of this film is a slight improvement over that afforded to the original, so too is this audio transfer.

    Again, we have been presented with two soundtracks on this DVD: the original English dialogue in Dolby Digital 2.0 with surround-encoding and a bitrate of 192 kilobits per second, and an English Audio Commentary in Dolby Digital 2.0 with surround-encoding and a bitrate of 96 kilobits per second. I listened to both soundtracks just to be a completist.

    The dialogue is clear and easy to understand at almost all times, although the integration between the dialogue and the sound effects is a little unnatural, as you might expect from a film of this age. Leo McKern's rambling at the start of the film, I won't say exactly when because I don't want to spoil the plot, was a little hard to make out, and words such as Yigael may have you scratching your head, but the dialogue is otherwise perfect. There were no discernible problems with audio sync.

    The music in this film is also credited to Jerry Goldsmith, and it is just as hard to take seriously in this instalment as it was in the last. Just for good measure, the people responsible for this score decided to add some sounds in certain themes that remind me of frogs mating, which makes the whole score even harder to take seriously. Again, this score is about as subtle as the idea of driving a fur-coated jeep through a crowd of environmentalists, but this makes it strangely fitting to the needs of the film. Jerry Goldsmith, however, did not win another award for this effort, which can be explained by the fact that the score in this sequel is largely recycled from the original.

    The surround channels were sparingly used to support the occasional directional sound effect and the music, but for all intents and purposes, this really can be considered a monaural soundtrack with some occasional stereo elements. Considering that the film was originally presented in mono, this is probably better than we can really expect, but it is still a little disappointing compared to some of the miracles of remixing that we've received on DVD lately. Some elements of the score music, usually the frog-like sounds, came across as being distorted, but there was enough of a gain in the fidelity over any monaural presentation to justify the surround remix. The subwoofer was used to support the music and the occasional sound effect, such as that nasty little elevator death, but there was no real deep bass to speak of in the soundtrack. The subwoofer could have been turned off and nobody would have been the wiser, really.

Extras

    Matching the fall-off of the plot in comparison to the original Omen, this disc also carries a more minimal package of extras.

Menu

    The menu features an extensive, scene-setting introduction, some animation of Jonathan Scott-Taylor marching, and a Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack. It is also 16x9 Enhanced.

Audio Commentary - Harvey Bernhard (Producer/Writer)

    This commentary features the producer of this DVD edition interviewing Harvey Bernhard about the process of making this film. One of the producer's first claims is that he intended to make a trilogy out of The Omen from the very beginning. Given that the only person I have ever believed this claim from is George Lucas, and the believability of his claim in this fashion is tenuous at best, I found this to be somewhat laughable. The commentary is not quite as interesting as that which accompanies The Omen, taking noticeably longer to find its feet, but it is still quite rewarding once it does so.

Trailer - The Omen

   This two-minute, twenty-second theatrical trailer is identical to the one featured on the DVD of the original Omen film. Quite why it is repeated on this disc is beyond my comprehension, really.

Trailer - Damien: Omen II

   This two minute and fifty-six second trailer is presented Full Frame with Dolby Digital 2.0 sound. Its quality is somewhat rough, but it makes an interesting sort of insight into how films were promoted in the late 1970s.

Trailer - Omen III: The Final Conflict

    Clocking in at one minute and forty-eight seconds, this trailer is presented in the aspect ratio of about 1.44:1 with Dolby Digital 2.0 sound.

Censorship

    There do not appear to be any specific censorship issues with this title.

R4 vs R1

    The two versions of this disc appear to be fundamentally identical, making the local disc the version of choice due to PAL formatting.

Summary

    Damien: Omen II is a serviceable, even interesting at times, follow-up to the original, although it does help if you try not to take it seriously. The knowledge that Jonathan Scott-Taylor now works as a lawyer in London may help somewhat with that, although Lance Henriksen as a drill sergeant is enough to scare the proverbial Christ out of anyone.

    The video transfer is very good.

    The audio transfer is good, but not great.

    The extras are basic.
 
 

Ratings (out of 5)

 
Video sg.gif (100 bytes)sg.gif (100 bytes)sg.gif (100 bytes)sgh.gif (874 bytes)
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Overall sg.gif (100 bytes)sg.gif (100 bytes)sg.gif (100 bytes)sgh.gif (874 bytes)
© Dean McIntosh (my bio sucks... read it anyway)
May 16, 2001 
Review Equipment
   
DVD Toshiba SD-2109, using S-video output
Display Samsung CS-823AMF (80 cm) in 16:9 and 4:3 modes, calibrated using the NTSC DVD version of Video Essentials.
Audio Decoder Built In (Amplifier)
Amplification Sony STR-DE835, calibrated using the NTSC DVD version of Video Essentials.
Speakers Yamaha NS-45 Front Speakers, Yamaha NS-90 Rear Speakers, Yamaha NS-C120 Centre Speaker, JBL Digital 10 Active Subwoofer


Overall | The Omen | Damien: Omen II | Omen III: The Final Conflict

Omen III: The Final Conflict

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Details At A Glance

General
Extras
Category Horror Audio Commentary - Graham Baker (Director)
Theatrical Trailer
Trailer - The Omen
Trailer - Damien: Omen II
Rating r.gif (1169 bytes)
Year Released 1981
Running Time 103:52 Minutes
RSDL/Flipper RSDL (57:41)
Cast & Crew
Start Up Menu
Region 2,4 Director Graham Baker
Studio
Distributor
Fox.gif (4090 bytes)
Fox Home Entertainment
Starring Sam Neill
Rossano Brazzi
Don Gordon
Lisa Harrow
Barnaby Holm
Mason Adams
Case Gatefold
RPI Boxed Set - $99.95 Music Jerry Goldsmith
 
Video
Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame None English (Dolby Digital 2.0 , 192Kb/s)
English Audio Commentary (Dolby Digital 2.0 , 96Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio 2.35:1
16x9 Enhancement
16x9Yes.jpg (4536 bytes)
Original Aspect Ratio 2.35:1
Miscellaneous
Macrovision Yes Smoking No
Subtitles Czech
Danish
English for the Hearing Impaired
Finnish
Hebrew
Hungarian
Icelandic
Norwegian
Polish
Portuguese
Swedish
Annoying Product Placement No
Action In or After Credits No

Plot Synopsis

    The law of diminishing returns states that the third sequel in any movie trilogy will be the worst, but Omen III, or The Final Conflict as it was originally titled, is an exception that proves the rule. Granted, it cannot hold a candle to the original Omen, but it does a better job of continuing the story than Damien: Omen II. The central problem with The Final Conflict is that it is rather silly at the best of times, with the attempt to kill every newborn baby in England making for a hilarious reference to Herod's greatest crime (if you believe the gospels). If scripts were truly unnecessary to making a great film, then this one would have possibly reached classic status on the strength of the overacting alone.

    The world has changed a lot from the period depicted in Damien: Omen II, with the Thorn Industries conglomerate extending its tentacles all over the world, with interests in food production being central to the plot. A salvage operation in Chicago to recover the artefacts that survived the destruction of the Thorn Museum collects the seven daggers of Megiddo, which change hands repeatedly until being bought in an auction. There, they are distributed to a group of seven monks, led by Father DeCarlo (Rossano Brazzi), who embark upon a mission to rid the world of Damien Thorn (Sam Neill). Damien, meanwhile, is flexing his political muscle, using his intimate knowledge of biblical prophecy to predict that he will soon be offered the position of Ambassador to England, or Ambassador to the court of Saint James as the title actually goes. The current Ambassador (Robert Arden) proves to be something of an obstacle until he is hypnotized by a Rottweiler into shooting himself, giving us a sequence that earns this film the R rating by itself.

    When the President of the United States (Mason Adams), who is never known by any other name during this film, offers the position of Ambassador to Damien, Damien makes it clear that he intends to run for a position in the United States Senate in 1984, which he states as being two years from the date depicted in the film. If Damien is thirty-two and wants to run for the Senate two years after being made an Ambassador in 1982, we're retrospectively placing his birth in the 1950s, which destroys continuity with the first Omen, which in turn clearly stated his birth date as six in the morning on June the sixth, 1966. If he were running for the Senate at the age of thirty-four, then he would have to be doing this in at least the year 2000 (Hillary Clinton might well be the AntiChrist, then, now that I think about it). Meanwhile, the seven monks make some hilariously ill-conceived attempts upon Damien's life, while Damien starts to court a journalist by the name of Kate Reynolds (Lisa Harrow). Meanwhile, the signs all point towards the Nazarene making his Second Coming in the British Isles, so Damien sets about eliminating him before his powers are too diminished.

    [Dean's Note: Plot spoiler ahead - highlight to read] The ending of the film had me quite disappointed, really, as the description of how Damien is supposed to be killed in The Omen clearly specifies that his blood must be spilled upon a holy altar on hallowed ground. Not only that, but Bugenhagen clearly specified to Robert Thorn that the daggers have to be arranged in an outward-radiating pattern in a crucifix shape. To have Kate simply stab him in the back with one dagger before he falls down and dies in front of the Nazarene is a real letdown compared to the possibilities that the original specified method bring to mind. Perhaps it is more intriguing to portray the AntiChrist as a child rather than as an adult, after all.

    Anyway, that little rant about the literary quality of the legend being portrayed in this film aside, this film is well worthy of your consideration if you enjoyed The Omen and Damien: Omen II. There are plenty of amusing gaffes and blunders, the two I've just rambled about being the biggest examples, but the story needed a conclusion, and this is a perfectly good one at that. I'm sure you will have no trouble ignoring the fact that an appalling telemovie was made ten years later, since most of movie-going society doesn't.

Transfer Quality

Video

    Omen III gets the best transfer of the trilogy, although it is not without a few small problems.

    The transfer is presented in the original aspect ratio of 2.35:1, and is 16x9 Enhanced.

    The transfer is quite sharp considering its age, more so than one would expect from most films of this age, in fact. The only real clue to the age of this film is its distinctly ordinary shadow detail, with blacks containing little or no discernible details most of the time. There is no low-level noise to spoil the black patches in the transfer.

    The colours are still muted and drab in that distinct Days Of Our Lives style, although this is tempered by the occasional splashes of vibrant greens in the British countryside. There are no problems with bleeding, misregistration, or miscoloured frames as was apparent in maybe a second's worth of frames in the previous film.

    MPEG artefacts are not a problem at all in this transfer. Film-to-video artefacts are still slightly problematic, although this transfer is an improvement over that afforded to Damien: Omen II in the film-to-video arena. Some telecine wobble is apparent during the later half of the closing credits, and aliasing is still a slight problem. Most of the instances of aliasing were very minor, but there was one bad one at 9:53 on a car that narrowly misses Robert Arden. Car chrome still shows aliasing in great quantities, but this is generally tolerable because cars don't appear as frequently in this episode of the trilogy. Film artefacts were plentiful, and sometimes a little intrusive, but they were acceptable in the context of the film's age.

    Like the other two Omen DVDs, this one is RSDL formatted, with the layer change taking place during Chapter 9, when the two priests close in on Damien at 57:41. It is a noticeable layer change, but not quite as disruptive as the one in Damien: Omen II.

Audio

    In contrast to the other two Omen films, which were originally presented in mono, Omen III: The Final Conflict was originally presented in Dolby Stereo, a matrixed format not too unlike the Pro-Logic format. As a result of this difference in the original format, and in all probability the different source materials, the soundtrack on this DVD seems more tightly integrated with its surround-encoding.

    There are two soundtracks on this DVD: the original English dialogue in Dolby Digital 2.0 with surround-encoding and a bitrate of 192 kilobits per second, and an English Audio Commentary in Dolby Digital 2.0 with surround-encoding and a rather paltry bitrate of 96 kilobits per second. I listened to the entirety of both of these soundtracks, although I will comment more on the audio commentary later.

    The dialogue is clear and easy to understand at all times, and there are no usages of words in this film that might confuse the average listener as was the case in the previous two episodes. Some of Rossano Brazzi's dialogue consists of chanting in Latin, but this was of little consequence to the overall story. Brazzi's English, as is pointed out in the commentary, is not exactly the best, but he is more than capable of getting his point across. There are no discernible problems with audio sync.

    The score music in this film is credited to Jerry Goldsmith, and it is a somewhat different beast to that which is featured in the other two episodes. Although it is still about as subtle as driving an armoured personnel carrier through a school playground, the chants that begged for the send-ups they've gotten over the years are more subtly integrated into the overall musical scheme. Overall, the musical side of this film is much improved compared to its predecessors, almost taking on the narrative element common to all the Star Wars films, and it is something of a shame that we weren't given an Isolated Score with this film.

    The surround channels are used to support the music, and some directional effects such as the radio-controlled helicopter. Overall, the surround channels are only subtly used, but they seem a little better integrated into the overall soundstage, as does the dialogue. Granted, it still doesn't hold a candle to the surround channel usage on more recent films, but it is the best episode in the trilogy where surround channel usage is concerned.

    The subwoofer was used sparingly, taking some redirected signal to support the music and some of the sound effects used in the assassination attempts. It supported all of these things without drawing attention to itself, although this might have more to do with the lack of deep bass in the original soundtrack.

Extras

    Again, we have a basic collection of extras in comparison to that provided for The Omen.

Menu

    The menu features another lengthy introduction, some mood-setting animation, a Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack, and 16x9 Enhancement.

Audio Commentary - Graham Baker (Director)

    Okay, so the audio commentary provided for Damien: Omen II was no great shakes, but this commentary is a real disappointment by comparison. It would have been much better with some participation from Sam Neill, Lisa Harrow, or screenwriter Andrew Birkin, or preferably all three. Neill and Harrow would have made the commentary much more interesting, given their history together. It is presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 with surround-encoding and a paltry bitrate of 96 kilobits per second. There are frequent lengthy pauses in the commentary, and there is not much of a real insight into how the film was put together or what sort of artistic decisions were made.

Theatrical Trailer

    Presented in an odd aspect ratio that looks to be about 1.44:1 or thereabouts, without 16x9 Enhancement, this one minute and forty-eight second theatrical trailer is presented with Dolby Digital 2.0 sound. The soundtrack is plagued by hiss, and the video quality of the snippets from The Omen leaves something to be desired, but the trailer is worth a look anyway.

Trailer - The Omen

    This is the same hazy Full Frame, Dolby Digital 2.0 trailer that was placed on the DVD of The Omen, making me wonder why it couldn't have just been placed on the first disc and simply left there.

Trailer - Damien: Omen II

   This is the same hazy Full Frame, Dolby Digital 2.0 that was on the DVD of Damien: Omen II, which also should have simply been left on that DVD.

Censorship

    There are no specific censorship issues with this title, except to say that it is somewhat surprising that this episode in the trilogy was given an R rating when the original has been re-rated MA. No footage has been deleted from this release, however.

R4 vs R1

    The Region 1 version of this disc is available separately from the Region 1 boxed set, but there is otherwise no difference between the two discs.

Summary

    Omen III: The Final Conflict has a bit of a problem with keeping the story straight. It is, however, a satisfying conclusion to a memorable horror trilogy.

    The video transfer is good.

    The audio transfer is good.

    The extras are basic.
 

Ratings (out of 5)

 
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 © Dean McIntosh (my bio sucks... read it anyway)
May 17, 2001 
Review Equipment
   
DVD Toshiba SD-2109, using S-video output
Display Samsung CS-823AMF (80 cm) in 16:9 and 4:3 modes, calibrated using the NTSC DVD version of Video Essentials.
Audio Decoder Built In (Amplifier)
Amplification Sony STR-DE835, calibrated using the NTSC DVD version of Video Essentials.
Speakers Yamaha NS-45 Front Speakers, Yamaha NS-90 Rear Speakers, Yamaha NS-C120 Centre Speaker, JBL Digital 10 Active Subwoofer


Overall | The Omen | Damien: Omen II | Omen III: The Final Conflict