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Although the marketing gimmick of releasing a remake of The Omen on the 6/6/06 (the number, we are never allowed to forget, of the Beast) appears to have paid off as far as box office goes, John Moore's new version of a classic piece of horror cinema really has little to recommend it once the initial fuss has dispersed.

Closely following the plot of the 1976 original, the film tells the tale of an Ambassador and his wife who, through a series of unfortunate events, begin to suspect that their adopted child, Damien is not all he seems. A series of grisly deaths, strange supernatural occurrences and seemingly hysterical warnings point Robert and Katherine Thorn to the unthinkable conclusion that he is the Antichrist.

It seems unfair to compare this new version of The Omen to its thirty year old template but, when the director has chosen to tell the story with such little variation on the previous version it is inevitable that comparison will arise. A key annoyance is that ideas in David Seltzer's original book that failed to make the first film are again ignored. The intriguing back-story of Father Brennan and Mrs Baylock, who have a connection in the novel, is left out again when it would have given much needed depth to the characters.

There is a sense of upping the ante throughout the film. The deaths are more extreme which seems to make them less feasible. One character is not only impaled but also receives a faceful of stained glass; a horrifying fall is not from the first floor but the second and a stabbing is dragged out into a bone crunching hit and run attack.  

Once we arrive at the famous beheading sequence, the film has entered Final Destination territory rather than the smart religious thriller that it could easily have been. Moore certainly displays heady aspirations, controversially linking the impending Armageddon with the Asian Tsunami and the 9/11 attacks amongst others. Using footage from these actual events might have seemed like a bold move to ground the film in reality but in fact it cheapens The Omen and feels like ill-judged exploitation.  

Perhaps one of the better additions is the startling dream sequences that occur in the film to illustrate Katherine's (and later her husband's) growing sense of unease. Although on the surface they appear designed simply to lift the audience from their seats (and they do, thanks to piercing wails of the soundtrack) they also feature odd, unsettling and often subliminal images that belong in a better film.  

The performances are never anymore than functional with the worst performance coming from Prague which is asked to play well beyond its range and fill in for contemporary London. With little or no effort to hide the local shop signs and radically different architecture, it never feels like the action takes place in what is a very distinctive city. An attempt to show Big Ben and the Millennium Wheel on the Prague skyline looks ridiculous as does the idea that the wheel would be visible from the Ambassador's plush countryside mansion. Part of the appeal of the original version was the authentic use of the geography of London. Here, when the action shifts around Europe, we never feel like we go anyway. 

The two lead actors are far too young for the roles, which unhinges much of the plausibility. The excellent and well cast Gregory Peck and Lee Remick in the first film highlighted the tragedy of the story; that these were two people desperate for a child no matter what and this was their last chance. Their desperation is taken advantage of and catastrophe ensues. Here the couple are far too young to know anything of last chances and while Liev Schreiber is just about passable, Julia Stiles barely looks out of her teens.

The distinguished supporting cast which includes Pete Postlethwaite and David Thelwis deliver oddly flat performances in roles clearly taken to pay the bills. Michael Gambon, an actor who really should know better, appears in a staggeringly bad scene that features exposition thickly delivered and told in a bemused style that suggests his tongue is firmly in his cheek.  
 
Mia Farrow is merely stunt casting (her role in the similarly themed Rosemary's Baby is obviously why she's here); she's never a threatening presence either physically or psychologically. Her killing of Katherine lacks any sense of menace and seems quite mundane in comparison to what goes on in the rest of the film. It certainly lacks the sheer sense of terror that Billie Whitelaw brought to the same scene.   

Beyond taking advantage of some release date hype, it's hard to see why The Omen has been remade. It's similar to the original and at times almost shot for shot identical but it's like a bad cover version and I found myself mentally ticking off each element that was superior in the original. From the absence of Jerry Goldsmith's iconic Oscar winning score to the fact that Damien himself lacks any sense of evil (a scene where he makes a sandwich in the middle of the night is as perplexing as anything you will see in the cinema this year), this is clearly a film made to meet a marketable release date and when commercial considerations are the only reason to revisit a classic, the results can only be diabolical.