Trailer
Plot summary
Robert Thorn is an American diplomat living in Rome with his wife, Katherine. When she gives birth to a boy, the hospital chaplain, Father Spiletto, tells Robert that the infant failed to survive, then presses him to take a newborn whose mother died in labor the same night. Robert agrees without confiding in Katherine, and the couple name the child Damien. Five years on, Robert serves as ambassador in London. His household is disturbed by an unwelcoming Rottweiler, by the suicide of Damien's nanny during his birthday celebration, and by the sudden arrival of a replacement, Mrs. Baylock. Damien will not set foot in a church, and at a safari park the animals react to him with fear. Father Brennan, a Catholic priest, keeps seeking Robert out with warnings about the boy's parentage.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Omen (1976)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The role of Robert Thorn was turned down twice: William Holden refused to star in a film about the devil, though he later played Thorn's brother Richard in the sequel Damien - Omen II, and Charlton Heston, given a firm offer on 19 July 1975, declined eight days later rather than spend a winter alone in Europe.
- Over 500 boys auditioned for the role of Damien. Four-year-old Harvey Stephens won it after Richard Donner encouraged the boys to attack him and Stephens clawed at Donner's face and kicked him in the groin; Donner then had the boy's curly blonde hair straightened and dyed black and gave him colored contacts.
- For the scene where Katherine's car is attacked by baboons, zoo staff deliberately did not feed the baboons the night before and food was placed around the car with a baby baboon in the back seat; only when an official swapped the baby for the alpha baboon did the animals attack, and Richard Donner said Lee Remick's terror was authentic.
- Jerry Goldsmith struggled for ideas for the score until, according to his wife, he suddenly and happily announced to her one evening, "I hear voices", meaning the orchestral chorus behind the film's foreboding Latin chant.
- Jerry Goldsmith's score for The Omen, including the film's theme song "Ave Satani", brought him the only Oscar of his career.
SPOILER
During its release in South Africa under the apartheid regime, the Publication Approval Board cut the film's final scenes, removing the killing of Robert Thorn and Damien's survival.
