The opening of Omega Man is more than riveting; it is transfixing. Welcome to Los Angeles, a dreary deserted
city. The world is dead
apparantly except for `The Family,' a collection of
some dangerous hooded holligans who by night
beseige the holdout Dr Robert Neville
secure behind the techno-moat and hi-tech ramparts of his castle. A bust of Caesar in his rooms pales
in comparison to Dr Neville's fortitude and imperviousness to the threat without.
The beseiging monkish attired albinos suffering from after-effects of the virus are not creatures or vampires.
Sincerely, rightly or wrongly, blaming science, technology, and materialism for the woes befallen,
`The Family,' despite its destructiveness, has overcome the racial conflicts that preceded the
world catastrophe.
How did this sorry state of affairs come about? Russia and China went to war unleashing
a deadly virus on the world, killing most but reducing survivors to an intense paranoiac anti-materialism.
A military doctor who found the anti-dote, Dr Neville is rescuing the treasures of civilisation by
day when his albino opponents cannot endure direct sunlight. At night whatever Dr Neville can't rescue may be burned
by Neville's paranoiac adversaries.
The black-robed blanched-faced Family commune in a convoluted pseudo-liturgical lingo.
Gleefully chanting "More! More books! Burn them all!,"
the Family is committed to razing all traces of normalcy.
The Family burns with white hot fury at the last normal man Dr Neville,
the smart scientific type that
caused all the trouble in the first place. Led by the charismatic
Matthias (Anthony Zerbe), The Family has no interest in
Dr Neville's serum or salvation from their nocturnal routine of superstitious
religious fanaticism.
Is Dr Neville really alone? He thinks so but ringing pay phones seem to follow in his wake as he busies himself trying to
save what little trinkets of scientific or cultural interest he can before his
enemies emerge safely from the darkness at fall of night. Heston' shout rings louder
than the summoning telephone buzz: "There is no phone ringing, dammit!!!"
Yet there are other normal survivors with whom Dr Neville eventually links up.
Leading this counter-Family is Lisa (Rosalind Cash) a tough, brave woman who has been struggling for survival
with a group of children and an impotent science nerd. And magic is afoot.
A new Adam and new Eve? Heston finds the lovely
Lisa entrancing. Can the normals do
as well as the abnormals in getting along together in a civilised way, long enough
to preserve the human race from extinction?
This reaches the essential contradiction between the normals and The Family.
The "good guys" are willing to carry and use deadly machine guns
against "bad guys" who have except for self-righteous rage against "the tools that
destroyed the world" otherwise live in harmony amongst themselves. Even one
of the normal children in Lisa's group warns Dr Neville,
"Sometimes you scare me more than `The Family.' " Yet as only Dr Neville's blood carries the
needed antidote, all hopes for humanity rest with Neville.
Don't forget humanity's hope for continuity also rest with Neville's
Eve, the lovely Lisa. And here comes the mall scene.
The normals decide against battling The Family in LA. Instead
of continual warfare in the deserted streets the normals choose to depart
for the protection of the countryside.
Of course every Eve needs a trousseau for her new life in the wilderness.
Dr Neville leaves Lisa in the mall to go shopping, but warns her not to stray too
far from natural light as The Family finds solitude in the shaddows.
What woman ever listened to her true love in shopping decisions?
Eve is taken by The Family and infected so that she can be the
bait for the final battle with Dr Neville.
Charlton Heston is outstanding in
his role as Dr Robert Neville. The religious allusions
and symbolism are haunting.
The backdrop of a vacant LA, the mother of hedonistic materialism left desolate by the plague,
seems cleverly appropriate.
A savior in an apocalypse, Neville though mortally wounded
collects up his blood for the normal survivors to preserve the antidote.
The dreary theme, underlining throughout, reaches its crescendo in
the tragedy of the ending. As the technological messiah saving the world from
ignorance and superstition, Neville gives up the blood
to redeem the normals from the dreaded darkness of superstitioun
and irrationality.