The original movie of the Omen, from 1976, was one of the finest horrors of the 1970’s. Three sequels and a remake have followed but none of them get close to matching the first film in the series. The First Omen is a direct prequel to the 1976 movie, and it is directed by Arkasha Stevenson, who co-wrote the screenplay with Tim Smith and Keith Thomas from a story by Ben Jacoby.
Nell Tiger Free (no relation!?) stars as Margaret Daino, an American sent to Rome in 1971 to work at an orphanage before she becomes a nun. She uncovers a sinister conspiracy to bring about the birth of the Antichrist in an attempt to scare people to embracing the church once more.
It is only a few weeks since Immaculate was released and now we have another scary nun movie. Whilst it has some effective moments, it lacks the originality and coherence of the Sydney Sweeney vehicle.
On the plus side, it has some good performances by Free, Bill Nighy, Ralph Ineson, and Nicole Sorace. It also has some creepy moments and one good plot twist. But the plot on the whole makes no sense – we are meant to believe that the Catholic church have been able to tame the devil so that they can make him mate with a girl so she gives birth to the antichrist. If they need Satan, why not just use the one they have controlled already? We are also meant to believe that a character has a 666 birthmark on their head but neither they nor anyone else had noticed.
Despite four people contributing to the script, only a perfunctory effort is made to tie this in with the 1976 The Omen, ignoring specific plot points from that film when it pleases them. In fact, the film feels pretty lazily written. The writers appear to have thought that it is set in the 1970’s so everyone should wear flares and big collars, not realising that fashion was a few years off. It also irked me that there was a scene in a club playing pumping disco music from the mid 1970’s, including Boney M’s Daddy Cool, which was released in 1976!
I had high hopes for The First Omen but it ended up largely disappointing.
Rating: 5 out of 10