Omen Guy

Guest Blogger: Edward October from OctoberPod

This month we invited back three time Rondo Award nominee Edward October to be a guest writer. Edward narrates true and true-ish classic tales of horror and the paranormal, and today he is doing a deep dive into the classic horror flick: The Omen. Be sure to take a look at their YouTube show (Octoberpod) and a listen to their podcast (Octoberpod AM) to get your spooky fix. You can find them both on his website:

https://www.octoberpodvhs.com.

…and now…here’s Edward!

Anyone who follows OctoberpodVHS on the app everyone still calls Twitter, you probably know my feelings about the Beatles: that they're an unusually talented boy band, but otherwise very overrated; so overrated, in fact, that I'd say they're the most overrated act in the history of popular music. I grow weary of the endless stream of think pieces, retrospectives, TV specials, memoirs, tell-alls, biopics, docu-series, and documentaries on a subject that's been sucked dry and which sucks all the air out of the room when the conversation could be focused on the other endlessly fascinating recording artists (from the most innovative period of music history) who are all every bit as interesting and talented as these Liverpudlians with Spock haircuts who were only making music together for less than 8 years. I used to feel the same way about THE EXORCIST ... that it was a well made horror picture, but neither the best nor the scariest picture ever made. (If THE EXORCIST is the scariest or most disturbing thing you've ever seen, you've likely never given THREADS or HENRY: PORTRAIT OF A SERIAL KILLER a spin.) My opinion of THE EXORCIST has mellowed with age (I think it's a masterpiece, but for my money SORCERER is Friedkin's greatest achievement) and I admire EXORCIST 2 and 3 more than most. A lot more ... in the case of EXORCIST 2: THE HERETIC (or “the hairy tick” as a disgruntled William Friedkin liked to call it). I've always been a bigger fan of that OTHER satanic horror franchise. That's right, I'm an Omen guy.

By the time I was in fourth grade, I was firmly in my Monster Kid phase. I loved Godzilla, King Kong, & The Gill Man and I was just dipping my toe in the waters other classic Universal and Hammer horror pictures. I practiced the rituals of Halloween as one would practice a religion & lapped up every monster movie book I could get my hands on. (I always had one of those Crestwood House Monster books checked out from the library.) But I was still a bit of a scaredy cat, and my parents did a good job of shielding me from truly frightening content. This was no mean feat, back when the 80s horror boom was depositing nightmare-inducing ads on the family TV day and night. As a result, it would be some time before I graduated from Monster Kid to Horror Hound. Then, when I was 11 ... my mom suggested I watch this scary movie called THE OMEN ... about a little boy who was born on the 6th hour of the 6th day of the 6th month, who turned out to be the son of Satan. It didn't take long for me to get my hands on a copy from our local mom & pop video store. And believe me when I tell you: the moment I popped that CBS FOX rental edition VHS of The Omen into the family RCA brand VCR ... my life was forever changed. What a picture!

Now, I'm not going to summarize the plot of this picture ... but I might say something from this point forward that'll spoil the movie for you ... if you're avoiding spoilers for a picture that's nearly 50 years old ... I don't know what to tell you ... just go watch it.

THE OMEN blew my mind ... from the death of the babysitter to the thunderstorm impalement to the room wallpapered with bible pages to keep the evil out to the weird portentous photographs to (what I still contend is) the Greatest Beheading in film history ... this thing served up images of horror and mayhem I'd never dreamed of. I'd never been so frightened watching a movie in my whole life. When I get scared...really scared watching a movie...the tips of my fingers and toes get all cold and clammy. That's what THE OMEN did to me ... and it's a high I've been chasing ever since.

Now I know what some of you might be saying. "I saw THE EXORCIST on opening night ... I waited 3 hours in a line the went around the block and when I finally saw the movie, a pregnant lady fainted in the aisles and had to be hospitalized to avoid a miscarriage ... and if YOU'D seen THE EXORCIST before seeing THE OMEN, you'd prefer THE EXORCIST ... and it would've made you a horror fan for life." And you're right, this is a valid point ... but there were things about THE OMEN that affected me, personally, in ways THE EXORCIST could not.

First: I'm an adoptee ... and the plot of THE OMEN hinges upon a closed adoption. This spoke to me ... but given the unfavorable portrayal of adoption and adoptees and the "biological child = good, adopted child = bad" dichotomy it establishes ... I now question the wisdom of my mother recommending this movie to me, an 11 yo adoptee, of all people. When I finally got around to watching DAMIEN: THE OMEN 2, I found myself identifying with and rooting for Damien. (Everyone is so shitty to him at the beginning of that picture. Damien doesn't know he's the antichrist, and he hasn't even knowingly done one single satanism ... yet).

Secondly: The Exorcist has a very pro-Christian, pro-Catholic point of view. And as a very good, well behaved church-going kid, both films would've frightened me on religious grounds. After all, to TRULY believe in and be TRULY scared of the devil, you must first be VERY deeply religious. But THE OMEN's woldview was a bit murkier than THE EXORCIST and more interested in political power than in spiritual damnation and salvation. THE OMEN was directed by Dick Donner (Dick Donner before Donner dicks you, as comedian Dana Gould would say), who made no secret of his non-belief, and who also made no secret that he directed THE OMEN to be "agnostic" on the subject of the supernatural. In other words ... if you're a believer then THE OMEN is a supernatural horror film that will reinforce your belief; if you're a non believer then THE OMEN plays more like a psychological thriller. As long as it got butts in seats, Donner was happy. This more agnostic, ambivalent approach to christian mysticism also spoke to the 11 year old boy who would grow into the not-quite-so-pious man I am today.

Finally: THE OMEN has one thing The Exorcist does not. It has Jerry Goldsmith jerrry-goldsmith-ing the shit out of one of his greatest scores. (It is, perhaps, The Greatest Goldsmith score ... but STAR TREK THE MOTION PICTURE might have something to say about that.) THE OMEN opens with the discordant monk chant of “Ave Satani” and injects scares, both overt and subtle, throughout the entire runtime. Hell, it even does it in the non-scary moments! The "love theme" from the Omen is a song called “The Piper Dreams,” which is basically just “Ave Satani” rearranged so that it sounds like a dreamy ballad ... and so even when the music is telling you things are safe, you're STILL listening to fucking “Ave Satani!” Every time I turned out the lights, or was alone in a room after first seeing THE OMEN, my mind would revisit haunting chunks of Goldsmith's score. It would play in my head before bed every night. And I'm not ashamed to admit that I slept with the lights on for at least a week.

Still, I was hooked with whatever THE OMEN-equivalent to Beatlemania would be ... and I lapped up the novel by screenwriter David Seltzer and OMENS 2 thru 4 in short order. They tried to resurrect the franchise wih an abysmal remake that no one asked for and just released a prequel no one asked for. I have to admit that The First Omen was much better than it had any right to be … which is quite a compliment coming from an old school Omen Guy!

If you enjoy classic horror stories ... as well as the occasional deep dive into my retro horror pop culture obsessions, then check out Octoberpod AM. It's the retro horror podcast for bold individualists, hosted by yours truly ... Edward October. Every two weeks we present true, true-ish, and classic tales of horror and the paranormal with a retro-vintage aesthetic reminiscent of old time radio and spoken word horror on vinyl. Find Octoberpod AM wherever you get podcasts, or on YouTube at Octoberpod Home Video. Follow us on the app formerly known as Twitter @OctoberpodVHS; on Blue Sky @octoberpod.bsky.social; or find all our links on the World Wide Web at www.OctoberpodVHS.com