Movie Review-The Sixth Sense

1.       M. Night Shyamalan also known as Manoj Nelliyattu Shyamalan is an Indian film director, screen writer and producer. According IMDb.com noted that he born in India but raised in the posh suburban Penn Valley area of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, M. Night Shyamalan is the son of two doctors. His passion for filmmaking began when he was given a Super-8 camera at age eight, and even at that young age began to model his career on that of his idol, Steven Spielberg. Besides, the style of directing that M.Night Shyamalan used to is having some sort of twist in the end or surprise ending in his films. He frequently uses shots of people's reflections in various objects. (IMDb.com,2009)

Source：

M. Night Shyamalan Biography, retrieved from http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0796117/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm

2.       Dr. Malcolm Crowe is a child psychologist and he got a new patient that has a problem far outside of his profession. Cole Sear is six-years-old child and claims to see the spirits of dead people all around him. Cole has extraordinary powers and can channel the ghosts of those who were troubled. Cole doesn't understand his powers, and he has little control over them. However, he's terrified by what he sees, and Dr. Malcolm is the only one with whom he feels he can share this secret. The Sixth Sense (1999) Dr. Malcolm is then discovering he actually had died one year ago, and he really get shocked.

Source:

The Sixth Sense (1999), retrieved from

http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/sixth_sense/

3.       "The Sixth Sense" isn't a thriller or horror movie but a genre of drama (tragedy). At first, I thought it was a horror movie but I’m wrong, the storyline is more concentrate on the emotional portray by the character. So, I think M. Night Shyamalan want to change our perception toward this film by the twist plot and the horror part is just to convey the story effectively.

4.       The main character,Dr. Malcolm Crowe and the kid named Cole Sear play very important role in this film. According Roger Ebert (1999),the psychologist is Malcolm Crowe, who is shot one night in his home by an intruder, a man who had been his patient years earlier and believes he was wrongly treated. The man then turns the gun on himself. "The next fall," as the subtitles tell us, we see Crowe mended in body but perhaps not in spirit, as he takes on a new case, a boy named Cole Sear who exhibits some of the same problems as the patient who shot at him. Maybe this time he can get it right. These characters are important in contributing on the effect of the plot, this is because if without the existence of the boy, Dr. Malcolm might not realized that he is actually dead.

Source:

Robert Ebert (1999),retrieved from

http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-sixth-sense-1999

5.       Concept ‘twist’ in this film is very important because it relate the beginning and the end of the story in which Dr. Malcolm had been shot down but never reveal that whether he is still alive or not in the beginning of the story. Without this element in the film, the audience won’t feel suspicious on the story. The feeling  of suspicious keep the audience eyes on the film.