A new release list I posted included 'The Omen 20th Anniversay Edition' and one might have wondered what, exactly, "20th Anniversary Edition" meant (except, of course, for Jeff Graebner who figured out right away that it meant the film was released 20 years ago <G>). As it turns out, I'm not really sure there is such a thing and I don't know where Ken Crane's got that tag. Nowhere on the jacket of the new 'The Omen' reissue does it say "20th Anniversay Edition". The new, remastered disc is, essentially, just that, a remaster, with a couple of nice touches.
The transfer is, like the recent reissue of 'Die Hard', a tremendous improvement over the previous widescreen disc, though the previous 'The Omen' was a worse transfer that the previous 'Die Hard'. Likewise, the remaster of 'The Omen' is not quite up to the remaster of 'Die Hard', but it so thoroughly eclipses the previous effort as to make it irrelevant. Even though the age of the film elements is beginning to show, every aspect of the new transfer is clearly superior to the older disc.
Besides the transfer, Fox added a bit of window dressing as well. Jerry Goldsmith's Oscar® winning score is isolated on the analog tracks and presented in stereo (the film is mono). The aid those interested in the score, the disc is copiously chapter encoded (53 markers for the feature!) with all the music cues noted in the chapter index. Following the film, Fox also included a full screen trailer. The best part is the price. At $39.95, it's 10 bucks cheaper than the older disc and a lot better to boot. This may not be called an "anniversary edition", but is sure beats the hell out of the older disc.
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