Bruce Willis Was Dead the Whole Time!
I decided to end the October Horror-thon with my favorite scary movie, one that is apparently not a horror movie according to the websites I’ve checked. But fuck ’em, there are dead people in this movie so I’m counting it. This movie is The Sixth Sense, aka “The Best Movie M. Night Shyamalan Had in Him.” This is the movie that did the special twist ending so well that he felt every movie he made had to have a much worse version of it. Let’s find out how well The Sixth Sense holds up, written and directed by M. Night Shyamalan, and starring Bruce Willis, Haley Joel Osment, Toni Collette, Olivia Williams, Donnie Wahlberg, and Mischa Barton.
Dr. Malcolm Crowe (Bruce Willis) is drunk and boring his wife, Anne (Olivia Williams) by incessantly bragging about receiving an award for being a really good child psychologist. They go upstairs to get a little freaky naughty and find a window broken and a strange, mostly naked man in their bathroom. Malcolm figures out that this guy is a former patient named Vincent Grey (Donnie Wahlberg). Turns out Grey is not happy because Malcolm wasn’t able to help him with his problem 10 years earlier, so he shoots Malcolm in the stomach and blows his own brains out. Cut to next autumn, where Crowe is creepily watching his next patient, Cole Sear (Haley Joel Osment). Malcolm has taken a particular interest in this young boy because of his tight, form-fitting jeans and his similarity to Grey. “This time,” he resolves, “I WON’T get shot.” It takes some time for Malcolm to gain the confidence of Cole, but when he does, Cole tells Malcolm his secret: Cole sees dead people. Malcolm wants to give up on Cole, but he also doesn’t want to get shot in 10 years. The movie continues on to it’s resolution of Cole’s problem, the classic Shyamalan twist, and the credits.
When this movie first came out, it was a phenomenon, and with good reason. Not only was it a well-made movie and a well-written story, but the twist at the end was so epic and so well-hidden that it was a gigantic faux pas for someone to ruin it. I hadn’t remembered it, but my roommate told me that he remembers ruining it for another one of our friends and that getting them really pissed off. I, however, got to witness it without my douchebag roommate’s spoilers and so I enjoyed the movie immensely. The story is a fairly classic one that happens in a lot of ghost movies when someone is the sole person that can see them. The twist is what separates this movie from the others. The atmosphere is also one to be appreciated. It’s quiet and slow as it builds the tension and, though I grant that it does go for a lot of startling, the mood it creates elevates those scares when they happen. Things like the cabinets opening when the mom leaves the room, the lady in the kitchen with cuts on her wrists, and the boy with the head wound all get a nice jump out of the audience. But someone needs to talk to these ghosts about first impressions. When Osment decides to try to help the ghosts, the first one pops up out of nowhere and vomits at him. Why don’t you throw up BEFORE you go talk to him, and maybe wave him over from across the room. And was it necessary to grab his leg out of nowhere when he was in your room to help you? Not cool, Mischa Barton! The use of color was also very nice as the objects that are red are usually things that you should pay attention to because they have significance later on or indicate a heightened emotional state. The ones I can remember are the red doorknob and the wife, Olivia Williams. After the events of the first part of the movie, she’s usually seen wearing red and, at the end of the movie, you figure out what the heightened emotional state she’d be in would be.
The only negative I’d say about this movie is that, once you’ve already seen it, the movie isn’t nearly as special. Even though it’s over 10 years old, and I would assume almost everybody has seen it by now, I refuse to put the spoiler ending in this review. I think it’s a huge douchey move to ruin it for someone too. Eventually, there will be people who haven’t seen this movie because they’re only just coming to the age where they can watch it and I don’t want to be responsible for ruining it. This is a fine movie with some good chills and creepiness that is a perfectly good movie to watch, but watching it for the first time when you don’t know what’s going to happen is sublime. The first watch of this movie made it my favorite “horror” movie, but subsequent watches leaves it as only enjoyable and not nearly as epic.
The performances in this movie are also top notch. Bruce Willis puts on by far his greatest performances to date. He has to be serious, charming, and devastated at different times in the movie and I’ve still never seen him put on such a show before. He’s great in action movies and all, but it doesn’t require nearly as much range from him so I would have suspected he wouldn’t be capable of it. This movie also made Haley Joel Osment a household name for a good long time. He was the pinnacle of the child actor until he pretty much fell off the face of the Earth and was replaced by dual Fannings. He was absolutely fantastic in this movie. He seemed constantly depressed and on edge, and his character would have good reason to be. It’s a shame that he seemingly made such poor movie choices after this movie, and that his body grew up and his face didn’t, which makes him strange to look at today. But he was an adorable kid that first showed up in the awesome movie Forrest Gump. But besides Forrest Gump, The Sixth Sense, and A.I. Artificial Intelligence (though I’ve never seen that), he’s never been in a movie rated higher than 50% on Rotten Tomatoes, and seemingly stopped working about 4 years ago. I’m sure he’s plenty rich though, so I’m sure he’ll be fine. He was nominated for an Academy Award, though, along with the person playing his mother, Toni Collette. And with good reason there as well, because she was also fantastic as the working mom just trying to make it work with her outcast child. But it may not have been that realistic of a performance because, if I had a kid that could talk to ghosts and I was dirt poor, my first thoughts would be “I’m gonna exploit the crap out of you, boy!” Olivia Williams had a small part to the movie, but she did great at it. On first viewing, I would’ve said she was a bitch to Bruce, but once the twist is revealed, you get to see the nuance to her performance and appreciate it much more. Donnie Wahlberg deserves an honorable mention for his commitment to the part as well. He lost all kinds of weight for the role; so much so that I didn’t even recognize him when I saw it. He was very good also.
So there it is. The end of the October Horror-thon with my favorite horror movie, The Sixth Sense. The mixture of is fantastic story, epic twist, outstanding performances, and terrific cinematography will probably keep it my favorite horror movie of all time, regardless of the questionable nature of it’s “horror” title that I’ve bestowed on it. The only problem I can think of to this movie is that it isn’t nearly as epic when you already know the ending. So don’t be a dick and ruin this for someone if they haven’t seen it. Look, I just did a review of over 1000 words and didn’t spoil it, so you can too. And after that, just hope that Shyamalan can pull off another good movie before his career is over with all them Airbenders and Water Lady’s. I give The Sixth Sense a “It’s getting cold” out of “Some magic’s real.”
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