The Amazing Sixth Sense

Bruce Willis stars as child psychologist Malcolm Crowe, who is shot by a former patient who claims Crowe did nothing to alleviate his supernatural childhood terrors. Months later, Crowe is a changed man, isolated, remote from his wife (Olivia Williams), and quietly bent on helping another boy named Cole (Haley Joel Osment) who seems to be undergoing similar traumas to that of the gun-wielding

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Chalk this film up as an unusually intelligent thriller about that which scares us the most: accepting our accidents of fate. Crowe sees through Cole's facade, but it takes a long time before the boy reveals what's ailing him: he has an unwanted gift for seeing the dead, particularly those who have died violent, unjust deaths and seem to be seeking him out. He tells Crowe he has learned to deflect the worries of his single mother (Toni Collette) by drawing happy pictures instead of the horrifying ones he actually sees, and he has even made a deal with a local bully to pretend to be his friend. Toward that end, Osment and Willis could not be better in roles whose full meaning isn't entirely revealed until the final resolution. ) By the time the spooks really do start to show themselves, they completely unnerve us, not so much with their presence as by their sense of urgency or outrage -- the very things we've indirectly felt through Cole's daily tears. (Interestingly, Cole often seeks refuge in a makeshift tent in his room, which ends up amplifying his and our fear in much the same way as in Blair Witch.

While The Blair Witch Project is more primal in its suggestive scares, The Sixth Sense has an old-fashioned Gothic touch that Shyamalan uses with effective economy. Such discipline also keeps our attention on what is, in fact, a good yarn about characters ill-prepared for reasons of youth or circumstance to face their destinies. For most of the film's running time, all the director really needs to do is frame certain shots with an airy anticipation and throw in a few evocative details: chilled breath, leaves blowing along a street, the hint of a spectre rushing past a doorframe.

Shyamalan eschews computer-generated effects for a smidge of makeup on actors who convey plenty of ghostly mischief with their voices and expressions.

For most of the film, young Cole seems like a sharp but terribly frightened child, his slight frame a natural metaphor for an inability to cope with some awful, invisible force in his life.

Common topics in this essay:
Blair Witch, Joel Osment, Sixth Sense, Crowe Cole's, Osment Willis, Malcolm Crowe, , Toni Collette, Interestingly Cole, Wide Awake, blair witch,

Approximate Word count = 471
Approximate Pages = 2 (250 words per page double spaced)

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