LOS ANGELES, June 5: The date 6-6-6 — June 6, 2006, — is the devil’s day for many Christians, and Hollywood is not letting them forget it with the release of the horror remake, ‘The Omen’, on Tuesday.

The figure 666 is named the ‘number of the beast’ in the closing chapter of the Bible, the ‘Book of Revelations’.

The legendary fright flick is coming out in a new version to mark the modern calendar’s parallel with the triple six, the biblical number associated with Satan.

Directed by John Moore and starring Julia Stiles, ‘The Omen’ revives the 1976 horror classic about a man who discovers his son to be the devil incarnate.

The boy, Damien, has a 666 birthmark on his head. “His Day Will Come,” the film’s publicity threatens.

The film was originally entitled ‘The Omen 666’, playing on the designation for the devil found in the bible’s Book of Revelations, also known as the Apocalypse.

“This calls for wisdom. If anyone has insight, let him calculate the number of the beast, for it is man’s number. His number is 666,” it says.

But the studio 20th Century Fox pulled back from the first title. “We didn’t want to overkill the 666 with the title, but it’s clearly going to be a big part of the promotion,” Fox International’s sales and strategy director Craig Dehmel told Variety in April.

But it is the latest commercial tease on Christian beliefs and superstitions to come out of Hollywood. Last month ‘The Da Vinci Code’ swept into theatres worldwide on the back of a campaign taunting Christians with a nefarious alternative view of their church’s history.

“Normally, a marketer is going to be very very wary about using the devil,” said Robert Thompson, professor of television at Syracuse University in New York.

“But 666 has really emerged in the popular culture as a funny thing you bring up when you’re talking about a kid misbehaving on the playground. You say, ‘I bet this one has a 666 on his scalp’.”

“It’s almost done in a joking kind of way. But at the same time it still gives people kind of creeps. I know some very rational people who get very nervous when their phone number, their license plate has a 666 assigned.”

“It makes perfect sense to release it that day,” Mr Thompson said of ‘The Omen’. “I’m sure there are people out there who think that’s evil and Satanist, but that’s just a marketing ploy and it’s working.”

June 6 has sparked other commercial ploys. Gambling website BetUS.com is offering 10-1 odds that the Apocalypse will happen on Tuesday, noting that no one can ignore recent disasters like wars, the tsunami, terrorists, nuclear threats, and earthquakes.—AFP