Viking Night: Omega Man
By Bruce Hall
March 29, 2016
BoxOfficeProphets.com
Yeah, I hate that guy. So I will tell you up front that I haven't read the book, and I'm secure enough not to mind your knowing that. Just know that the setup for the film differs slightly, but it involves biological warfare between Russia and China wiping out virtually all of humanity. Now, there's nothing for Charlton Heston to do but grab a rifle and tool around the deserted streets of LA in a stolen car, casually shooting at shadows in the windows of abandoned buildings. It's a cool way to start a film, and there aren't many people who look cooler doing it.
By the way, is it okay if I also admit to not being a big Heston guy? I like him, but I find his acting style to be uncomfortably self-aware. Almost every character he ever played knew millions of people were just dying for him to get out of his shirt and punch someone. Dr. Robert Neville is just such a man, and yes - he DOES spend about half the movie shirtless and punching people. Neville is a former military biologist who may be humanity's last survivor, but you'll be glad to know he still knows how to have a good time, and that's where our story starts.
One of the things I like best about the post-Apocalypse genre is that I'm invariably compelled to wonder how I might behave in a similar situation. I therefore found comfort in the fact that Neville spends his time getting drunk, shooting guns, stealing cars and sitting in movie theaters with his feet up. There's actually a poignancy to this, as Neville watches his umpteenth screening of Woodstock, transfixed by the sea of humanity and able to wistfully recite the dialog from memory. Something we'd all take for granted on any other day means everything during the apocalypse. It's a lovely sentiment.
In fact, the year before this movie came out, a documentary on Woodstock had become a huge cultural phenomenon. It's already a nice moment, and at the time I'm sure the added cultural significance made it more resonant. The problem is to a casual viewer that almost a half century later, and stripped of its contemporary context, The Omega Man feels like a really quaint and even slightly self referential piece of allegorical storytelling. The first few minutes of the film are a gun-toting Heston grinning like a tourist, purposely delivering a combination of expositional wisecracks and designed to highlight the two years his character has spent on his own.
It should be gripping. But despite efforts to make Los Angeles appear deserted (Film on a Sunday! Use grainy still photos!) you still catch an occasional pedestrian or car in the distance. That's not a huge deal but between that, Heston's trademark mugging and the suspiciously frugal production values, it's hard to take the story as seriously as it probably wants to be. Plus, if you're the kind of guy who likes high concept science fiction, you may find yourself wondering how, after two years, the power grid is still on. The gasoline in all the cars he steals is still good. The batteries are still charged. Aside from the conspicuous lack of people, there's really nothing happening here to convincingly indicate that civilization has been in ruin for 24 months. These are little things, and I know what you're thinking - I should be able to suspend my disbelief. But that only works when the gaps in logic allow you to tell a better story.
Not so much here.
The biggest issue is that if you haven't guessed by now (or if you've seen the movie posters), the last man on earth is not alone. Neville escaped the plague because he happened to be the guy working on a cure. Everyone else either died or was turned into something called a “nocturnal albino.” This is because the screenwriter found this more believable than “vampires.” I'm all for telling grounded stories, but when we first meet The Family (named after that one Fallout 3 mission, no doubt), they're led by a former television host named Matthias (Anthony Zerbe), who has them all dressed in matching futuristic black robes and aviator sunglasses.
I find this amazing. I can't get three people to dress alike on Halloween, with three months of advance notice. I'm not sure why, but I had a hard time getting my head around where a bunch of starving, diseased mutants got their hands on 1,500 pairs of matching Ray Bans, not to mention 700 bolts of that shiny looking fabric.
But that's not the worst thing in the world, either. The worst thing in the world is how The Family spend their evenings hanging around outside Neville's apartment, plotting how to destroy him. They blame him for the plague, even though it's common knowledge that the communists did it. Neville spends his time collecting art, drinking wine, and playing chess with a bust of Julius Caesar. His apartment is fortified with razor wire, sandbags and floodlights, and he keeps a high-powered rifle fitted with night vision at the ready. He's so confident in his security arrangements that he rarely even closes the patio door. Between you and me, it looks like an 11-foot ladder is all you'd need to take the place. Seriously, a couple of guys on pogo sticks with work gloves could probably at least get their hands on the balcony.
But The Family can't seem to crack ladder technology, so they build a freaking trebuchet instead.
You heard me. Breaking into Ace Hardware for a ladder was too much of a stretch, so someone went down to the library, checked out a book on 12th century battlefield tech, set up a drafting board, spent weeks planning the construction, collecting the materials, and deploying the weapon - only to fail as badly as if they'd attacked with water balloons. What was even the point?
And for his part, Neville's response is usually to lean out the window and spray the crowd with gunfire, indiscriminately killing several mutants in the process. I guess I just don't understand what everyone's up to here. Neville has an elaborate security apparatus set up in his apartment, but he seems to have no goals other than having a good time. It's hard to see where he gets his will to live. It's never really explained why The Family holds Neville responsible for everything, and spends so much time collecting fabric and building medieval siege engines in his front yard instead of you know, trying to find food. Everyone's motives are unclear, and the logic behind most of their actions is virtually nonexistent. It's frustrating enough trying to follow a movie that makes so little sense - what's worse is having to watch characters attempt solutions to problems that feel like they really shouldn't exist at all.
The story takes a turn about halfway through, when Neville runs into another survivor named Lisa (Rosalind Cash), who seems unaffected by the disease. Lisa turns out to have friends, and Neville develops an interest in using his medical knowledge to help them. But up to this point he's been the consummate narcissist, and it's easy to assume that his mind has been changed by the availability of casual sex.
Before the apocalypse, Neville was dedicated to finding a cure, but since then his humanity appears to have withered on the vine, and I guess I don't buy his character arc. Much was made at the time of the interracial kiss between Heston and Cash (a kiss that by today's standards, barely qualifies as physical contact), but if you ask me, Neville is just another in a long list of antagonists motivated to action only when a woman half his age is willing to take her pants off.
The Omega Man is filled with monologues, delivered by characters who don't always have convincing reasons for believing what they believe. And most of the actions taken by most of the characters fail to advance the plot so much as they merely keep it from collapsing altogether. By the time we arrive at the film's climactic ending, its impact is actually almost humorous. It's supposed to be a moment of redemption, but a single action does not a character arc make. This is a movie filled with lazy shortcuts that actually has the audacity to end on one. It's a shame because there's a fascinating story of human compassion and understanding underneath all that bluster. But like Matthias and his gang of cornball zealots, it's just not up for the light of day.