With: Nell Tiger Free, Maria Caballero, Nicole Sorace, Tawfeek Barhom, Sônia Braga, Ralph Ineson, Bill Nighy, Charles Dance
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Written by: Tim Smith, Arkasha Stevenson, Keith Thomas, based on a story by Ben Jacoby, and on characters created by David Seltzer
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Directed by: Arkasha Stevenson
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MPAA Rating: R for violent content, grisly/disturbing images, and brief graphic nudity
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Running Time: 120
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Date: 04/05/2024
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Antichrist & Diced
By Jeffrey M. Anderson
Arkasha Stevenson's horror prequel The First Omen doesn't waste too much time trying to reconcile its relationship with the 1976 original, and instead concentrates on some solid scares and some surprising smarts.
Margaret (Nell Tiger Free) arrives in Rome, taking up residence in a church and orphanage where her old mentor Cardinal Lawrence (Bill Nighy) works, and begins preparing to take the veil and serve her life as a nun. She meets her roommate Luz (Maria Caballero), a novitiate who wants to have a good time before she takes her vows, and she meets a mysterious older child, Carlita (Nicole Sorace), who resides there.
She's also approached by Father Brennan (Ralph Ineson), who warns her of a great evil going on at the church, and asks for her help. If she can steal certain records from the orphanages' archive, then they can prove Father Brennan's sinister theory: that the church is conducting secret experiments to birth an antichrist.
It's the feature directorial debut of Stevenson, a woman, The First Omen is, significantly, focused on a woman's rights to control her own body, and has as its villain a force attempting to rule the world through fear, rather than compassion. It's set in the early 1970s, but is still startlingly relevant.
She handily avoids dumb jump-scares or other cliches. An early fright in which an intruder seems to appear in Margaret's room is elegantly and organically done, without the cheap, percussive sound effects designed to trigger a jump. The horror here seems to come from a human place, a place of hurt and uncertainty. It doesn't much matter that certain supernatural elements are glossed over in order to get to the point; we just accept them.
Of course, The First Omen is obligated, in its final wrap-up, to tie directly into the events that begin The Omen (including a photo of Gregory Peck in a file folder), but it mainly feels like its own movie, disconnected from and rising above the rest of the series.
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