How well does The Sixth Sense play for a modern kid today who doesn’t know much about it? For that matter, how well does one of the most famous plot-twist movies in cinema history hold up to repeat viewings for someone who already knows the ending? Those are the big questions we explore in this week’s episode of the Film After 11 podcast.
I first saw The Sixth Sense in the theater back in 1999 and remember coming out unsure if I felt it lived up to all the hype that had been built around it. Just from the publicity and the cultural conversation, I’d pretty much figured out the twist before I stepped foot into the theater, and spent most of the time waiting for the big reveal.
Rewatching the movie with a couple decades’ distance allows a fresh perspective on how skillfully M. Night Shyamalan places subtle clues from the beginning without giving away the whole thing. Just as importantly, the story has layers of deeper subtext that are often lost in all the focus on the ghosts. The scene where young Cole insists to his teacher that people had been hanged in their school building says volumes about how messy history (even important history) really is, and how sanitized it’s typically taught to us.
Most of all, Haley Joel Osment… what an amazing performance for a kid who was only around 10-years-old during filming! Damn, what was I doing with my life at that age?
| Title: | The Sixth Sense |
| Year of Release: | 1999 |
| Director: | M. Night Shyamalan |
| Watched On: | Apple TV |
| Also Available On: | Blu-ray 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray Various VOD rental and purchase platforms |
Video Streaming
Buena Vista Home Entertainment (a.k.a. Disney) first released The Sixth Sense on Blu-ray back in 2008. I never had that disc, but just from the age and the studio’s home video history at the time, I expect it wouldn’t hold up too well today. Very few of Disney’s old discs do.
A 4K Ultra HD release came in 2024 to both physical media and streaming. I rented the latter from Fandango at Home. I have no doubt the remaster probably looks a lot better than the old Blu-ray, but the 1.85:1 image is fairly soft regardless, with muted colors and no sense of HDR that I could see. At least, that’s the result I got on streaming.
On the other hand, detail is sufficient to occasionally spot the seams in Bruce Willis’ hairpiece, though a remastered Blu-ray could likely do that just as well.
The Dolby 5.1 soundtrack has subtle but effective bass and very nice musical fidelity in the James Newton Howard score. Much of the dialogue is spoken in hushed whispers, and fidelity is fine. If surround activity is present, it’s so restrained I hardly noticed it.
Related
- Bruce Willis
Note: Any screenshots on this page were grabbed off a web browser, and came out looking much softer than actually watching the movie on a streaming device. They are used for illustration purposes only.
The Video File Blog 
One of the very last LaserDiscs, too. I half expected you to have (had) it in your collection 🙂
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