Topic: Does the Sixth Sense really make sense?
After watching, and really enjoying Unbreakable, I decided to watch The Sixth Sense last night. I really enjoyed that also, but there were a few issues I had with the movie that I don't think make a whole lot of sense.
Spoiler (click to read)
First of all, I want to say a few things that I thought was great about the movie. Although the ghosts aren't harmful or bad in any way, they are genuinely creepy, and allow the movie some really quite scary scenes. Some of the scenes from this film were straight out of a horror movie, and it felt like a good film choice for Halloween. I also like how the ghosts aren't monsters, they're exactly what they were like when they were alive, only dead, which is quite refreshing for a ghost movie. The scene where Coal explains to his mother about seeing ghosts and tells her about her mother was really emotional. Undoubtedly I got a little misty eyed then.
So, before I begin, I want you to understand that I do in fact really like this movie, it's just I feel the movie has a few wholes that need to be explained:
So, Bruce Willis' character doesn't know that he's a ghost. He assumes his mourning wife won't talk to him, because she feels as if he puts his work before her. She didn't have a problem with this before he was shot, so why would she suddenly feel differently after he was shot?
Unfortunately, I had the ending spoiled for me, so I knew he was a ghost from the start. Throughout the whole movie, I could see that no one acknowledged his existence, and that was very clever. For the audience, we don't know he's a ghost, but if we had spent an entire year, with no one acknowledging our existence, wouldn't we have made the conclusion eventually that we were dead?
Also, how did he enter Coal's house, without talking to his mother? Wouldn't she be shocked by the fact that a stranger welcomed himself in? And does he never talk to her about her son's case?
I can't help but feel that if he was a ghost all along, that the entire film would make sense. Instead, we were given one of the biggest surprising twists in movie history, it's a shame it left me with too many question marks.
Don't read the following, unless you've watched Unbreakable!
Spoiler (click to read)
Now this might not be a popular opinion to have, but I actually prefer the twist ending of Unbreakable. It's a massive surprise, but when watched again, you can see all the clues that lead up to the ending. Unlike The Sixth Sense, it didn't leave me confused, or feel like it was full of plotholes.
Last edited by William Osborne (October 29, 2016 (08:10am))