"I see dead people." - Cole Sear
Around the time of its release, The Sixth Sense was among some of the first of a surge of PG-13 rated horror films that stretched across the early 2000s. I say stretched but the word that comes to mind first is plagued. There were the exceptions as there always are but for a vast majority of the first decade of the 2000s there was serious PG-13 rated sewage coming out on a regular basis. Soul Survivors in 2001. Never heard of it? You’re not alone. Darkness Falls in 2003. Decent premise but as is the case with a lot of PG-13 rated horror, it’s incredibly neutered. The Grudge in 2004 was laughable. I mean I was literally laughing when I saw it. When a Stranger Calls in 2006, a movie forgotten by time and pretty much anyone who saw it.
But for seemingly every ten or so awful entries, we would get genuine gold. The Others in 2001 is psychological terror at its best. 1408 in 2007 is a highly underrated Stephen King adapted short story that pushes its main character to his breaking point and well beyond in epic fashion. The Mothman Prophecies in 2002 is tension fueled dread with lasting, haunting imagery and terrifying prophetic warnings of impending tragedy. But as I said, in the beginning of this run of diet coke horror, came perhaps the best of them all, M. Night Shyamalan’s first true trek into horror, The Sixth Sense.
If ever there was a better demonstration of terror and drama melded together, with its particular rating, than The Sixth Sense, I’m not sure I’ve heard of it. It pushes the boundaries of psychological horror utilizing everyday tragedy. From car accidents and accidental shootings to things more sinister like slow, methodical poisoning. The key factors among them all is suddenness and usually unforeseen blunt physical trauma.
It’s a tremendous example of everyone having problems. No matter status or mental state, we are human and we come with baggage. Malcolm Crowe is a child psychologist with a deteriorating marriage and it’s only getting worse. Still he persists in his life’s pursuit of helping traumatized children. His latest child is Cole Sear, a loner with isolating tendencies. He’s alone and pushes everyone away. He loves his mother but doesn’t know how to talk to her. As Malcolm discovers, there is far more happening beneath the surface of a little boy isolating himself from the world. But to heal him, they must become acquainted.
In the time to follow Malcolm explores the everyday life of Cole. He meets his mother, sees where he goes to school and perhaps most telling, he sees where Cole goes to seemingly hide, in a place he feels safe but isn’t his own home. In a beautifully constructed Catholic church, Cole bursts inside everyday to find peace within himself. As we soon learn, he is there to have a moment of not just peace but quiet before his waking nightmare escalates as it seems to do everyday when the sun sinks beyond the city limits.
What appears at first to be a little boy afraid of the dark, afraid of the sunless sky quickly reveals itself as something he is in dire need of escape from. Malcolm can help him but first he must put aside every scientific fact or notion he’s familiar with and simply listen to the literal meaning of what this dear boy is quietly screaming about. When trust is built between them, Cole, wrapped snug and safe under a blanket, confides in Malcolm his greatest secret, not even known to his own mother. The revelation that Cole tells Malcolm shocks him but also allows him for the first time to truly hear what Cole is telling him. There are no euphemisms or hyperbole or ambiguity in his statement. Cole is his most literal in this moment and Malcolm is beginning to realize it.
As a kind of mirroring of what he sees from Malcolm, Cole braves his fears and begins to listen and help where he can. He is more terrified than he has ever been but suddenly he sees the changes with the entities he interacts with. He begins to see his effect on those around him and that his presence can bring good into a world he knows only as dark and grim. And by learning to talk and reason with his fears, he learns how to speak to his mother, knowing she feels hopelessly distant from her son. And now he can help Malcolm. Although the doctor wasn’t aware he was in need of help, Cole knew.
Not strictly seen as a horror movie by some, I would argue it’s one of the best of the genre. Its imagery of the dead is unsettling, creepy and downright petrifying. It plays as a drama with horror as a sort of sidecar but so do movies like The Babadook and Hereditary (more on this later). Perhaps those are more extreme examples but it still stands among them.
It’s also a wonderfully constructed film study of properly creating a story of zero meaningless symbolism. Everything you see means something to some degree. The colors, the settings, the choices of what to reveal and what not to. It’s all with a purpose to set up a massive reveal that takes the entire first perspective of the movie and changes everything about every character and perhaps at one time, their seemingly random decisions, suddenly come into perspective upon a second viewing.
Much like the fear Cole addresses he creates awareness for them to finally find their own peace and move on. Cole is simply the conduit for those that just might need a little extra attention before finding resolution. Malcolm was a presence meant to understand what was happening to Cole and once he did, it gave perspective to Cole who could then pay it forward to the likes of a once abused housewife or a boy way too curious about his father’s gun. Or maybe a child psychologist whose marriage is dying and he can’t understand why.
Everything about The Sixth Sense comes down to one theme - people helping people. Cole needed Malcolm to help understand his ability. In return Cole could help Malcolm realize things about his own reality. And by understanding his scary visions, Cole could reach his mother, desperately trying to find him in the dark of their ceaseless, isolating sadness. And suddenly, despite the notion that tragedy will continue as it is a part of life, Cole now has a means of facing it with an actual plan to help and calm the terror of his own existence.
The performances are subtle but impactful. Haley Joel Osment as Cole is adorably unnerving and raw. Bruce Willis at his side is tragically stoic but assured in his determination to help Cole. They are perfectly lost together in their attempts to find answers for their many questions looming over them. Toni Collette showcases some of what she would fully unleash years later in Hereditary. She is powerfully broken but yearning to hold on in hopes of greener pastures. They are all, in their own unique ways, naturally and emphatically pessimistic but hopeful if only in small, seemingly unimportant silver linings. They all are fighting individual battles and demonstrate this in hauntingly honest performances.
The Sixth Sense is most famous for its massive twist in the final twenty minutes. But beyond this it’s a lasting piece of cinema for its tender but dark approach to mental illness, domestic abuse, murder, suicide and a myriad of other tragedies of everyday life.
It reaches down to our most basic but terrifying nightmares and makes them all too real. For me, it’s the abused mother in a pink bathrobe. This scene has stuck with me for nearly thirty years. My own mom used to wear a similar robe at night and seeing this at the ripe age of ten in a dark theater was a searing and sobering experience. It is one of the most haunting sequences in cinema that I have ever seen primarily for personal reasons and it has never left me. I think this is one of the most lasting effects of The Sixth Sense, each moment resonating for each of us for very different reasons. Even if it’s just empathy, it sticks, like superglue. It is, in my opinion, one of the most masterfully made PG-13 horror dramas ever conceived.
Rated PG-13 For: intense thematic material and violent images
Runtime: 107 minutes
After Credits Scene: No
Genre: Drama, Thriller, Horror
Starring: Bruce Willis, Haley Joel Osment, Toni Collette, Olivia Williams
Directed By: M. Night Shyamalan
Out of 10
Story: 10/ Acting: 9/ Directing: 10/ Visuals: 9
OVERALL: 10/10
Buy to Own: Yes.
Check out the trailer below:
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