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Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.
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Sixth Sense, The
Buena Vista Pictures
FILM:
MPAA RATING: PG-13 for intense thematic material and violent images
Starring
Bruce Willis,
Haley Joel Osment,
Toni Collette,
Olivia Williams,
and
Donnie Wahlberg
In this chilling, psychological thriller, 8-year-old Cole Sear (Osment) is haunted by a dark secret: he is visited by ghosts. Confused by his paranormal powers, Cole is too young to understand his purpose and too afraid to tell anyone about his anguish, except child psychologist Dr. Malcolm Crowe (Willis). As Dr. Crowe tries to uncover the ominous truth about Cole's supernatural abilities, the consequences for client and therapist are a jolt that awakens them both to something harrowing...and unexplainable. (Hollywood Pictures)
| GENRE(S): |
Suspense/Thriller
|
| WRITTEN BY: |
M. Night Shyamalan
|
| DIRECTED BY: |
M. Night Shyamalan
|
| RELEASE DATE: |
DVD: March 28, 2000
Video: March 28, 2000
Theatrical: August 6, 1999
|
| RUNNING TIME: |
106 minutes, Color |
| ORIGIN: |
USA |
All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...
100
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
William Arnold
I haven't been so captivated, chilled and surprised by a movie in years.
90
Washington Post
Desson Thomson
The 11-year-old Osment evokes the boy's terror and awful predicament so memorably, you'll never forget him.
88
Chicago Tribune
Marc Caro
Perhaps the most startling part is the realization that, in the turn-off-your-brain season of summer, you've just experienced an uncommonly serious-minded movie that's brave enough to engage our deepest emotions on issues of death, madness, illusion and forgiveness. That's the biggest thrill of them all.
88
USA Today
Mike Clark
The filmmaker keeps upping the ante with surprises until the plot-twist beaut that concludes the picture - a shocker that, upon reflection, is probably the one ending that wouldn't have fallen a little flat.
88
Philadelphia Inquirer
Carrie Rickey
An unnerving and astonishing thriller.
88
New York Post
Rod Dreher
(Osment) delivers what may be the greatest performance ever by a child actor.
85
TNT RoughCut
Matt Kelsey
Willis puts his action-hero stereotype on the back burner to deliver one of his most intriguing roles since "12 Monkeys."
83
Entertainment Weekly
Lisa Schwarzbaum
It's a psychological thriller that actually thrills.
80
Chicago Reader
Lisa Alspector
Eventually writer-director M. Night Shyamalan neutralizes Willis's star presence with impressive plotting that's a fine excuse for the powerful atmosphere.
80
Film.com
John Hartl
The boy (Osment) has an uncanny ability to suggest Cole's secretive, haunted soul, and he seems to have inspired Willis to give perhaps his most self-effacing performance.
80
The Onion (A.V. Club)
Keith Phipps
Teeters on the brink of New Age ludicrousness, but it never goes over: Like Kieslowski and others, Shyamalan knows that what makes for lousy metaphysics can make for powerful metaphor, and in the end he creates a deeply, surprisingly affecting film out of a little bit of smoke and brimstone.
80
Los Angeles Times
John Anderson
So disarmingly eerie it's virtually guaranteed to rattle the most jaded of cages.
80
LA Weekly
John Patterson
Writer-director M. Night Shyamalan lets the tension rise slowly, leads you everywhere you don't expect, doesn't rip you off and totally freaks you out -- all without stale effects or gore.
80
Film.com
Tom Keogh
Chalk this film up as an unusually intelligent thriller about that which scares us the most: accepting our accidents of fate.
80
Film.com
Peter Brunette
It's far more loquacious and cerebral than your average run-of-the-mill thriller, but boy, when the relatively infrequent scares do come, they will pull you out of your seat and raise the hair on your arms.
78
Austin Chronicle
Marc Savlov
Works best when it works its mournful magic alone, without fanfare, using only the flickering fear in Cole's gaze as it meets the compassion in Crowe's.
75
Chicago Sun-Times
Roger Ebert
Has a kind of calm, sneaky self-confidence that allows it to take us down a strange path, intriguingly.
75
San Francisco Chronicle
Mick LaSalle
If this isn't the single best performance ever by a preadolescent male (Osment) in a motion picture, then it's tied for whatever is first.
75
San Francisco Examiner
Wesley Morris
Ultimately affecting mix 'n' match weeper.
75
Portland Oregonian
Diana Abu-Jaber
Sometimes verges on silliness.
70
Newsweek
Walaika Haskins
Although the film occasionally descends into mawkishness, Shyamalan is skilled at bringing the tension to excruciating heights.
70
Washington Post
Stephen Hunter
It's like an enema to the soul as it probes the ways of death ? some especially grotesque in a family setting. You leave slightly asquirm. You know it will linger.
70
Time
Richard Schickel
Unfolds with a patient intelligence. The Sixth Sense might not scare you out of your wits, but it could reward them.
70
Slate
David Edelstein
Ultimately, it has less in common with "Blair Witch" than with such quivering lumps of sentiment as "Ghost" and Field of Dreams."
63
New York Daily News
Jack Mathews
A metaphysical shaggy-dog story, whose unpredictable punchline is its only redeeming feature.
60
Variety
Todd McCarthy
Borderline dull to sit through, The Sixth Sense is actually rather interesting to think about afterward because of the revelation of its ending.
50
Christian Science Monitor
David Sterritt
The thriller's best and worst features all stem from a highly unusual plot structure that builds to a genuinely startling conclusion.
50
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)
Jeff Gray
At least tries to disturb us, rather than shock us or gross us out, and that is admirable. But it doesn't pull it off, and the movie is indicative of the trouble Hollywood has these days making that most frightening kind of movie -- the kind that lets the audience frighten itself.
50
Village Voice
Michael Atkinson
Complain all you want about Willis's posturing and the rabbit-in-the-hat ending (predicated as it is on a vast plothole), the film is still a rarity, a studio horror movie focused on a child's traumatic stress.
50
Dallas Observer
Bill Gallo
The flashy sensationalism of The Sixth Sense -- maybe the best thing about it -- is at war with its desire for contemplation.
40
TV Guide
Maitland McDonagh
Buried deep inside this ponderous, repetitive psychological thriller is a fantastic half-hour "Twilight Zone" episode.
38
ReelViews
James Berardinelli
An inferior product. It is not well written, well acted, or well directed.
30
Mr. Showbiz
Kevin Maynard
The biggest piece of supernatural hooey since estranged wife Demi Moore's "The Seventh Sign."
30
Salon.com
Charles Taylor
Because the movie never fully engages us, it never quite manages to allay our queasiness about watching the boy's distress.
20
The New York Times
Stephen Holden
Because it unfolds like a garish hybrid of Simon Birch and What Dreams May Come, with some horror-movie touches thrown in to keep us from nodding off, "The Sixth Sense" appears to have been concocted at exactly the moment Hollywood was betting on supernatural schmaltz.
 The average user rating for this movie is 8.5 (out of 10) based on 53 User Votes
Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.
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