sixth sense essay

Authors Avatar

                    Sixth sense essay

“How does the director of the ‘Sixth Sense’ manipulate the viewer so the ending is unexpected?”

This essay “The Sixth Sense” will answer the question “How does the director of the Sixth Sense manipulate the viewer so the ending is unexpected” Child psychologist Malcolm Crowe, played by Bruce Willis is one night visited by an ex-patient named Vincent, angry, enraged. He wounds Crowe, and then kills himself. A few months later, Crowe is visited by a 9-year old boy named Cole. He sees dead people who do not know they are dead. Because of this, he is called a freak in school. Crowe at first thinks he is seeing things, but after spending a lot of time with him, he discovers Cole may be seeing dead people after all. The twist at the end is that Malcolm Crowe is actually dead himself which neither he nor the audience realise until the end. Malcolm doesn’t understand that Cole is the only human being he can communicate with as he is the only person with the ability to see ghosts.

Although the ending is unexpected, there are many clues in the film that make the ending and hint that all is not what it seems. The colour red is used throughout the film to indicate the real world being tainted by the supernatural world, for example in the dungeon scene where Cole is wearing a red jumper. Cold breath and the temperature falling are also used to indicate when ghosts are present and angry, for instance in the scene where you see the “Honeywell” switch turn and decrease the temperature in the room and straight away you see the cold breath come from Cole’s mouth. Also none of the ghosts have shadows which is why whenever you see Malcolm Crowe, you never see his shadow. A small clue which you really need to look out for to recognise is the lock of white hair in Cole’s hair which tells you he has been through a scary and traumatic life.

Join now!

Despite the clues, there are also various techniques that distract the viewer from the truth that Malcolm Crowe is dead. One of the techniques is the use of camera shots, angles, movements and the way the scene is shot, for example in the restaurant scene, where Malcolm is talking to his wife and we believe that she is upset with him whereas actually she doesn’t know he’s there. We also never see the physical injury that Crowe sustained on the night he was shot which lures us away from the truth. He is always wearing either a jumper or ...

This is a preview of the whole essay