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75A faithful remake of the 1976 film, and that's a relief; it depends on characters and situations and doesn't go berserk with visuals.
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Director John Moore has added some creepy visuals and assembled an unusually strong cast for a horror flick.
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70The remake is directed by another slickster, the Irishman John Moore, who is no deep thinker (as his "Behind Enemy Lines" confirmed) but, like Donner, he's an able hack -- smooth, stylish, clever, soulless and a hoot. And so's his damned movie. And it is damned.
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63The Omen remake is creepily efficient. Unlike one of the newfangled horrorfests, it doesn't drown you in brackish atmosphere and surround-sound you with techno music.
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63There are no surprises for anyone who's seen the earlier version, and younger horror fans may find the modest body count and restrained gore unsatisfying.
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63The casting is weaker this time. Watching Peck crumble under fear and doubt was like seeing a skyscraper implode; Schreiber's more of a whipped puppy for most of the film.
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60Seriously, that kid is creepy as hell.
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60Competently made, and enjoyably played. But you do really end up wondering what the point was. Cinematic déjà vu is the most likely response.
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60Despite slick camera work by Jonathan Sela and intense, naturalistic performances by Liev Schreiber and Julia Stiles, The Omen retains the aura of ceremonious kitsch of the first movie, favoring a well-lighted, upscale Goth aesthetic punctuated with flashes of well-timed, cymbal-crashing shockers and giggly camp.
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60Will a movie that scared the bejezus out of moviegoers 30 years ago pack the necessary wallop and carnage to satisfy fans of blood-soaked modern horror? The answer is a qualified yes.
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58Besides offering the giddy pleasure of seeing Mia Farrow play a demonic nanny, there's not much to the film that a repeat viewing of its earlier incarnation couldn't provide.
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50In a move reminiscent of Gus Van Sant's "Psycho," some shots are lifted directly from the original and much of the screenplay is identical.
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50Rent the original. It tells exactly the same story, with a better cast and with special effects that are as good or better.
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50The remake is a solidly crafted movie with a lot of good scares, but it also raises the question: Why even bother with an update?
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50The devil has a new spawn, but this one is not nearly as creepy as its progenitor.
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50This is one of those movies that profits from very low expectations. If you go in expecting something dreadful, be assured: It's only near dreadful.
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50Transplanting so much of the original story to a 21st-century setting only amplifies how badly the story has aged.
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If the movie didn't take itself so seriously, it could have been a great popcorn muncher. As is, it'll still work fine for those willing to forgive its trespasses.
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50At least in the new Omen, the filmmakers have the sense to keep evil Damien's dialogue to a minimum. His villainy is all in the dimples. But is it too familiar to be scary anymore?
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50This new version is an almost scene-for-scene remake, which is good news in the first half and bad news in the torpid second.
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42There's one moment that achieves the camp shiver of the original, when Damien's nanny hangs herself at his birthday party (''Damien, it's all for you!'').
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42New director John Moore just doesn't have original director Richard Donner's filmmaking flair, so the same scenes done the same way on phony-looking Prague locations without the benefit of Jerry Goldsmith's Oscar-winning score just seem terminally slow and flat.
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42Pretty much everyone in the cast is wildly overqualified, including Pete Postlethwaite and David Thewlis in key supporting roles.
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40The release date is the most original thing about it.
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40Utterly pointless remake.
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Yet another remake no one needs is The Omen.
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40The actors sleepwalk through their roles (save for Rosemary herself, Mia Farrow, chewing the scenery with termitelike gusto as the boy's satanic protector), while Moore, who previously directed "Behind Enemy Lines" and the "Flight of the Phoenix" remake, seems completely at a loss without any planes to crash.
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There's a fascinating movie buried inside this story, but it's not the one the filmmakers decided to make. This Omen is simply too big for its britches.
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Schreiber and Stiles are good actors, and they're actually acting, if not to any actual avail. In the silliest recasting, a comically exaggerated Mia Farrow takes over for steely Billie Whitelaw in the evil nanny role.
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38Fans of the original will end up doing shot-by-shot comparisons. On every level, The Omen isn't just bad filmmaking, it's bad storytelling.
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30Terminally glum and waterlogged.
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25Not since Gus Van Sant inexplicably directed a shot-by-shot remake of Hitchcock's "Psycho" has a thriller been copied with so little point or impact.
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25It's a terrible sign for a movie when the sole reason for its existence is a satanic opening date.
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25Compared to Al Gore's new global-warming documentary, "An Inconvenient Truth," The Omen makes the Apocalypse look comforting and child-friendly.
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User score distribution:
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Positive: 12 out of 25
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Mixed: 6 out of 25
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Negative: 7 out of 25
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SkipH.4Hard to see why this remake was made.
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DannyD4