Quick recap: A kid sees dead people and also it’s really cold all of the time.

from savagechickens.com

Fun (?) fact: M. Night Shyamalan said that he got the idea for The Sixth Sense after an episode of ‘Are You Afraid of the Dark?’. That show used to freak me out so much as a kid so it’s nice to know that it stuck with someone else as well.

My thoughts: Welcome to Horrorfest! The past couple of years have mostly been about trying to find something to truly terrify me, but seeing as how the list has started to dwindle a bit, my new theme is ‘Whatever is Left’. Catchy, don’t you think? Anyway, first up we have The Sixth Sense, which I chose because it is currently streaming on Netflix. I have seen this movie a few times, including once when it was still in the theater and embarrassed myself by crying because the ending confused me. So, yes, I knew about the ending beforehand, which, if you don’t, A: Congratulations on not getting spoiled yet! The internet can be a cruel, terrifying place about stuff like this  and B: Probably best if you skip this post for now and keep your purity.

Knowing the ending before sitting down to watch the movie made it a little less fun, but not much. I started out trying to find all of the clues that would’ve given away that Malcolm was dead, but gave up pretty quickly because I was so wrapped up in the story. The details I did manage to find made the twist seem so obvious, but only if you know what you are looking for. For example, there is a very obvious close up to Bruce Willis’ face when Cole says that he sees dead people, yet that could also be explained by the director wanting to get a reaction shot. In the end, the realization was still a shock even though I knew it was coming. I liked that Shyamalan used shots from what we had already seen to explain what happened, rather than Malcolm just saying, ‘ Oh my god. I’m dead.’It’s nice when directors choose to trust that their audience can figure out what is going on.

What surprised me most this time around was the emotional punch this movie gave. As an adult, the ghosts no longer scare me, but the idea of having a child with this ability does. I’m not even talking about the ability to see ghosts, but any disability or something not easily treatable. Then there’s the idea of losing someone you love and trying to put myself in Anna’s shoes but being unable to dwell on it too much because it made me so sad. It’s really funny to me how much this movie terrified me when it first came out and now it still terrifies me, just in different ways.

FInal review: 5/5 Also, good on Muriel for getting married and having a kid, although I wish it was in better circumstances. Poor Muriel.

Up next: More Horrorfest!