Despite the fact a hopeless fourth instalment was made for TV, this was supposedly the last act in the Damien Thorn trilogy. Sam Neill plays the now fully-grown Anti-Christ, and with a stab of dark humour he is the head of a multinational megaconglomerate called Thorn Industries. The prince of darkness is a hit in business! How satirical. That’s about as fun, or scary, or relevant, as this negligible horror movie gets.
The plot of the first two films were lean and telling — when people discover Damien’s true nature, they die horrible and exotic deaths in the presence of the large, slavering black dog. The Final Conflict tries to keep the whole sticking-to-the-Bible style going, while pasting on some fatuous plotting about a squad of super-holy monks, who have knives that can rid of his eternal smarminess. The Christ turns up for his second coming in the form of a bright light, but let’s not get ahead of ourselves.
Neill doesn’t really take hold of the role — he is overly serious and uncharismatic. You really should have some fun when playing Satan’s offspring. Since we’ve returned to England (after the American set Omen II) it looks grey and mundane, cloudy rather than apocalyptic, with none of the shadowy force that Richard Donner gave the original. Even the fanciful deaths are a let down, with the highlight a man who gets an iron in his face from his evil-consumed wife. Half the time it feels more like an Omen parody than a chance to give it a great send off. You’ve got to be a truly rotten filmmaker to make the second coming such an anticlimax.