# Final Conflict, The (1981)

### reviewed by
Ted Prigge

    THE FINAL CONFLICT (1981)
    A Film Review by Ted Prigge
    Copyright 1998 Ted Prigge

Director: Graham Baker Writer: Andrew Birkin Starring: Sam Neill, Lisa Harrow, Rossano Brazi, Don Gordon, Barnaby Holm, Leueen Willoughby

"The Final Conflict" ends the "Omen" films as far as the story of Damien is concerned (there's another one, but that's really not counted as one), and sadly enough, it does it with an anticlimactic bang. We've seen Damien growing up, as people discovered that he's the antichrist, as well as himself discovering that, and in this film he's all grown up, successful, and fully aware of what he can do, and willing to do anything in his power to see that the prophecies of the Book of Revelations, that says that he will eventually perish, don't come true. What a bore.

Or at least it shouldn't be. If anything, the second "Omen" film proved that despite a film being a total contradictory mess, it could at least be worthy of some entertainment value. This film can't even be very fascinating. Damien is now the slasher, instead of Satan, and this brings about a huge problem: the first two, where Satan killed people, was mysterious and eerie; here, when Damien kills people himself, it seems bland. The magic of the original films is definitely gone in this one.

"The Final Conflict" has to do with "The Great Recession," when Jesus' second coming is supposed to take place, which is a big threat to the now-30ish Damien (a younger Sam Neill), who's now filled the shoes of both his father and uncle by not only being the Ambassador to England, but also the head of the largest company in the world (or something like that). Damien wants to rule the world, and overcome the prophecy that says that God will pervail, and luckily enough has a pretty nice-sized cult of Satanists to back him up.

Also introduced are a group of monks, headed by Brother DeCarlo (Rossano Brazzi, who was once a semi-star in the 40s and 50s - he was the lead in the movie version of "South Pacific"), who have recovered the special knives that need to be used to kill Damien right (although I think that the whole killing-him-on-sacred-ground spiel has been voided, or at least forgotten). The first hour tracks their attempts to assasinate Damien somehow, but instead of being competent monks with real passion and intelligence in killing him, they come off as the Keystone Kops (get this: one monk tries to kill him in a TV studio while he's being interviewed, slips, has his foot caught in a stage rope, manages to blow something up, sets himself on fire, and burns to death - HA!).

The film also tries to balance a cheap love story as well, dealing with Damien's affair with a British journalist, Kate Reynolds (Lisa Harlow), who actually sleeps with him (there's something to tell her girlfriends), but finds that he's much more interested in her younger son (Barnaby Holm)...for his successor. Eventually, Kate is visited by DeCarlo, the only surviving monk from the first half, who takes it on himself to actually get some aide from others in his attempt to save the world.

The main thing that is wrong with this film is it's passionless. Although it still has Jerry Goldsmith's frightening and adrenalin-rushing score to undertone everything, and even a couple great sequences, the film just lays flat on screen and assumes that we're really fascinated by it's high level of Christian paranoia, something that the other two films neatly worked with. There are fewer murders, as well as fewer scenes of general horror, and it actually tries to come off as being a serious drama, and later on, a part of propaganda for being a hearty follower of Christianity (it has not one, but three passages from the bible posted on its screen at different times). The trilogy has moved from being a series about the rise and fall of Damien or finding horror in the Holy Scriptures, and is now a serious way of rounding up people to go to Church and pray for their souls.

This is sad because there are some really great moments in this film, especially a frightening bit in the middle where we see Damien giving a speech to legions of his followers, and them on the hunt to kill any male child born on the night that Jesus was apparently born. These are some of the best moments of the trilogy, and it's sad that there weren't more like them.

The thing is by the third film, and after probably seeing several films about the coming of the antichrist (need I mention "Rosemary's Baby?"), you're probably done being scared by the idea of the antichrist coming. And it's not like "The Final Conflict" gives you any other incentive for being scared by it because it's not even a real horror film as much as it is a bit of melodrama about ideas that are only scary on principle and not so when put in a film like this. "The Final Conflict" lacks the fun of the other two, the way that they weren't afraid to be essentially paranoid slasher films, and how they preyed on general Christian fears. This one tries to play it straight, to save the others from being too gory or satanic, and instead, it comes off as being, well, lame.

    MY RATING (out of 4): **

Homepage at: http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Hills/8335/

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