William Thorn Warren Popular Books

William Thorn Warren Biography & Facts

Damien – Omen II is a 1978 supernatural horror film directed by Don Taylor. It is the sequel to The Omen, and the second installment of The Omen series. It stars William Holden and Lee Grant, with Jonathan Scott-Taylor, Robert Foxworth, Lew Ayres, Sylvia Sidney, Lance Henriksen, Ian Hendry, and Leo McKern. Set seven years after the first film, it follows a now-pubescent Damien Thorn (Scott-Taylor) as he begins to realize his destiny as the Antichrist. Franchise producer Harvey Bernhard wrote the screen story, with a screenplay by Stanley Mann and Mike Hodges. Hodges was the original director, but was replaced by Don Taylor early in production. Unlike the first film, which was shot in England and Italy, filming of the sequel took place primarily in the United States, in locations around Chicago, Illinois and Wisconsin. The opening scene was shot in Israel. It was released by 20th Century Fox on June 9, 1978, and received mixed reviews from critics. A sequel, Omen III: The Final Conflict, was released in 1981. Plot One week after the events of the first film, archaeologist Carl Bugenhagen learns that Damien Thorn is still alive. Bugenhagen asks his friend Michael Morgan to deliver a box to Damien's new guardian, explaining that Damien is the Antichrist and that the box contains the Seven Daggers of Megiddo needed to kill him. When Morgan expresses scepticism, Bugenhagen takes him to a local ruin to see the mural of Yigael's Wall, which was said to have been drawn by a monk who had visions of the Antichrist as he would appear from birth to adulthood. Morgan believes him upon seeing Damien's face painted on the mural, but both he and Bugenhagen are buried alive after the ruins abruptly collapse. Seven years later, the 12-year-old Damien is living in Chicago with his aunt and uncle, Ann and Richard Thorn. Damien gets along well with his cousin Mark, with whom Damien is enrolled in a military academy, but is despised by Richard's aunt Marion, who sees him as a bad influence on Mark and threatens to cut Richard out of her will if he does not separate the two boys. Late one night, Marion suffers a fatal heart attack after being scared by a raven that appears in her room. Over the following days, a number of other bizarre incidents surrounding the Thorn family occur: a photojournalist who tried to interview Richard after seeing Yigael's Wall (and Damien in person) is run over by a truck after being blinded by a raven attack, a senior manager of Thorn Industries (a corporation owned by the family) drowns in a frozen lake, and two other employees are suffocated by toxic fumes following an unexpected gas leak at a factory plant. The latter incident also sickens Damien's class, who were visiting the plant at the time. At the hospital, Damien is the only student found to be unaffected by the fumes, but a doctor suggests keeping him in the hospital as a precaution. The doctor later discovers that Damien's marrow cells resemble those of a jackal, but is killed by a falling elevator cable before he can report his findings. Meanwhile, Bugenhagen's box has been found during an excavation of the ruins and delivered to the Thorn Museum. Dr. Warren, the museum's curator and Richard's friend, opens it and finds the sacred daggers, along with a letter by Bugenhagen explaining that Damien is the Antichrist. Warren rushes to inform Richard. Mark overhears their conversation and confronts Damien, who admits to being the Devil's son. Damien pleads with Mark to join him on his rise to power, but Mark's steadfast refusal "forces" Damien to kill Mark by causing an aneurysm in his cousin's brain. Shaken by his son's death, Richard goes to New York City to see a half-crazed Warren before being taken to the train station, where Yigael's Wall is being stored in a cargo carrier. As he sees Damien's image, Warren is killed in a freak locomotive accident, convincing Richard beyond doubt that Damien is the Antichrist. Upon his return, Richard has Damien picked up from his graduation at the academy while taking Ann to the museum in order for them to retrieve the daggers. After finding them, however, Ann uses them to kill Richard, revealing herself to be a Satanist and proclaiming that she's "always belonged to him". As she screams Damien's name, Damien, having overheard the altercation, wills a nearby boiler room to explode, setting fire to the building and killing Ann. Damien leaves the burning museum and is picked up by the family driver as the fire department arrives. Cast Development and pre-production Writing David Seltzer, who wrote the first film's screenplay, was asked by the producers to write the second. Seltzer refused, for he had no interest in writing sequels. Years later he commented that if he had written the story for the second Omen, he would have set it the day after the first installment, with Damien a child living in the White House. With Seltzer turning down Omen II, producer Harvey Bernhard duly outlined the story himself, and Stanley Mann was hired to write the screenplay. The earliest drafts presented Damien as a teenager and featured a female love interest. The love interest was deleted in the final film. Casting Academy Award-winning veteran actor William Holden was considered to star as Robert Thorn in the first Omen, but turned it down as he did not want to star in a picture about the devil. Gregory Peck was selected as his replacement. The Omen went on to become a huge hit, and Holden made sure he did not turn down the part of protagonist Richard Thorn in the sequel. Lee Grant, another Oscar-winner, was a fan of the first Omen, and accepted enthusiastically the role of Ann Thorn. Ray Berwick (1914–1990) trained and handled the crows used for several scenes in the film. Live birds and a crow puppet were used for the attack on photojournalist Joan Hart. Berwick also trained the avian actors in Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds (1963). Leo McKern reprises his role as Carl Bugenhagen from the original film. McKern is the only cast member of the series to appear as the same character in more than one instalment, although actor Tommy Duggan appears in the first and third instalments of the series as different characters. Damien – Omen II was the film debut of Meshach Taylor (Dr. Kayne). Production Under Mike Hodges Richard Donner, director of the first installment, was not available to direct the second; he was busy working on Superman. British director Mike Hodges was hired to helm the film. Four weeks into principal photography, however, Hodges left the film: "artistic differences" was the reason given to the media, but the producers were unhappy with Hodges' working methods which they claimed were too slow and placing the film behind schedule. Hodges nonetheless maintained a screenwriter's credit on the finished film. Harvey Bernhard cited a demonstrative instance where Hodges spent half a day's filming setting up a single shot of Damien coming from the stone pillars at the far .... Discover the William Thorn Warren popular books. Find the top 100 most popular William Thorn Warren books.