I knew it had a “surprise” ending but had avoided any explicit spoilers. However I was on the lookout and the “surprise” seemed totally obvious and telegraphed. I spent much of the film drumming my fingers, waiting for it to be over.
#1. I think we saw it on video, but I didn’t know there was supposed to be a big twist. Anyway I generally try to immerse myself in the story and not anticipate, so as not to spoil the fun.
I figured it out as soon as Bruce Willis was shot and we had the fade out. I thought it was pretty clear that he was dying and that was kinda confirmed by the fact nobody but the kid speaks to him or shows the slightest awareness of his presence for the rest of the movie. I’m amazed most of the audience didn’t seem to pick up on that. People not realizing they’re dead is a pretty common plot device in fiction.
I’m a 1. And that moment was one of the favorite moments of my entire movie-life. Mmmm, what a delicious moment.
I am not the type that needs big twists in movies at all. Movies like Signs and the Village were annoying because it seemed to ‘force’ a twist on me, against my will. But The Sixth Sense…yummy!
I’m in group #2. I’m a horror film weenie and really did want to see this in theaters, so I asked a friend who’d already seen it to tell me about the more spooky/gory scenes. I also requested the ending be spoiled because I feared it’d be something that’d give me nightmares. Still loooooooooved the movie, though. Saw it with hubby, who was in group #1, and enjoyed his reaction. (I can still hear him saying, “Noooo waaaay!”)
#1 for me. Didn’t know there was a twist and didn’t see it coming. That was part of what made it a great movie experience for me.
I wish reviewers wouldn’t announce that movies have a twist ending (even when they don’t tell readers the nature of the twist). Invariably, if I know there is a twist ending, I can figure out what the twist will be. I saw The Usual Suspects and The Others having read reviews that mentioned twist endings, and in both cases I figured out the twist about 20 minutes into the movie — with the result that I think I didn’t enjoy the movie nearly as much as other first-time viewers. The Usual Suspects seems like a ridiculously overrated movie to me, but I think maybe that’s just because I didn’t get surprised by the twist.
#1 – A friend whose movie opinion carries a lot of weight with me saw it opening night and told me the next day to see it as soon as humanly possible. I didn’t realize it at the time, but it was a matter of “see it before someone ruins it for you”. My wife and I saw it the next day, and had no idea until the reveal.
A story I love: The day after we saw it, we went again and brought my wife’s parents to see it. About midway through, as Bruce Willis is onscreen, my MIL leans over and says “He’s dead”. My wife and I were gobsmacked – there was nothing that had happened recently that could have given it away…how the hell had she figured it out?
“W-what do you mean?”, my wife asked her.
“Your father. He’s dead…I’m gonna kill him. I told him not to get <whatever candy he had gotten, when she wanted something different>”.
My wife and I shared a joint sigh of relief that neither of us immediately spilled the beans when she said something.
Yes, I’d like to add that to my comments too. I didn’t have a scooby-doo about the movie - I was bunking off work with this girl I liked and we decided to go to an afternoon performance of this movie I’d never even heard of.
I promise you, if you don’t know a damn thing about the movie at all, let alone a twist, the effect is electrifying.
I’m a 1. I loved that moment just after the reveal, when you cast your mind back over the entire movie and rethink all the scenes from a new angle. Great moment.
I’m in group 1, which kind of embarrasses me, as I normally spot twists early on.
If only M. Night had stopped making movies after he made Unbreakable. Sigh.
I’m a number 2. It was spoiled onstage with a comedy troupe I was working with at the time.
But I’d prefer to interpret that as a #4 because I managed to get the twist before even seeing the movie.
I figured it out from reading reviews. Just knowing that there was a twist made it easy to figure out. It was the same with The Crying Game.
I was in group #4 (I quickly asked myself–“Why is he wearing the same thing all the time?” and started paying closer attention from there).
A mortifying experience I had was that I started my MA (in Film Archiving) that following fall, and in one of my film discussion seminars, we were talking about Ambrose Bierce and Vertigo and other “Is he really dead?” examples, and I brought up The Sixth Sense.
Did I mention that I got my MA in the UK? And that the film hadn’t opened in England yet? :eek::o Fortunately, while the film was a hit in the States, the title wasn’t very familiar abroad yet, so I backtracked quickly (I realized my mistake almost instantly) and hoped that people wouldn’t remember months later when the film opened there.
I’m a #4. I figured it out when the kid was hurt and had to go to the hospital.
I wondered why the mom was being questioned/accused about child abuse rather than the the kid’s psychologist, who was standing right in front of them, being asked if the kid was prone to self-injury. I thought: “WTF? It’s like the kid’s doctor isn’t even standing there.” Then I said: “Ohhhhhh.”
This is my experience too. I was working in New Orleans while my husband stayed in Mississippi trying to rebuild the house, and I saw at least one movie a week in the theater while I was there alone. It was really a delight when the whole theater reacted like that. I took my husband to see it when I went home that weekend, and gasping ensued there, too.
So I was a 1+1.
This is a surprising reaction, to me. I think the movie is a very dramatic portrayal of a mother’s love for her son. Toni Collette’s performance is amazing. Pretend there’s no such thing as the supernatural, and watch it from the mother’s point of view. It’s absolutely heartbreaking. I think it’s an engrossing movie on that basis alone. Add in the supernatural, then the twist and BANG. It’s an unbelievable film.
I’d say that the Willis storyline is nowhere as interesting as the Colette/Osment storyline, which is IMHO a pretty big obstacle when it comes to me considering the film even “very good”. It’s the mother/son dynamic where the real emotion lies in the film; I think Willis is poorly cast and does not live up to what the material needs for his big revelation (he’s immeasurably better in Unbreakable), so even though I guessed the ending in advance, that doesn’t mean it still couldn’t resonate with me emotionally. It just doesn’t, which is why I’ve never been overly impressed with the film: expertly constructed but dramatically wan.
I’m a number one, but I saw it in the theater first run, too.
I wonder how many number fours knew to be on the lookout for the surprise twist ending? I think being told there was a twist is as bad as being told what the twist is.
Just before The Sixth Sense came out, I was at the video store looking at The Usual Suspects, when another customer I had seen before chimed in that I would love that movie, and would never guess the surprise twist at the end. Her husband started to shush her, saying, “Don’t tell him that, you’ll ruin the ending for him.”
She replied that she wasn’t giving away the ending, just telling me there was a twist. He was right, though. Because I knew there was a twist, I kept looking for it.
I ran into the couple at the video store a couple of weeks later. I asked her if she had seen The Sixth Sense yet. When she said no, I told her the ending. Her husband thought it was a lot funnier than she did.
Or at least stopped trying to shoehorn twists into movies that probably didn’t need them.
I agree with this completely. There is so much anguish in her performance when she thinks there is something just not right with the boy. And I distinctly remember feeling as if a lead weight was taken off my chest when the boy is finally able to tell his mom the truth rather than suffocate himself withholding it from her.