The series A posteriori le cinéma is intended as an opportunity to celebrate the 7the art by revisiting flagship titles that celebrate important anniversaries.
Introverted and anxious, 9-year-old Cole lives alone with his mother, Lynn. Enter Malcolm, a renowned child psychologist who struggles with a myriad of personal issues. But what starts out as a drama turns into a supernatural thriller when Cole whispers a secret that has gone down in the annals of cinema: “I see people who are dead.” An even more astonishing twist awaits us, The Sixth Sense (The Sixth Sense) based on one of the best revelations ever imagined. Released 25 years ago, in August 1999, M. Night Shyamalan’s film took everyone by surprise — literally. Spoiler notice…
At the time, Shyamalan was locked into a contract with Miramax and its boss, Harvey Weinstein. Desperate to escape Weinstein’s clutches, the young filmmaker exploited a loophole in the document, which contained no clause related to writing.
As the main person concerned reported to Hollywood Reporter in 2023: “It was a mistake by their legal department, so I thought, ‘I’m going to write the best script ever and try to get out of it.’ So I sat down and looked at the posters for Jaws [Les dents de la mer]ofAlien [L’étranger. Le 8e passager]of The Exorcist [L’exorciste] and of Poltergeist [Poltergeist. La vengeance des fantômes] hanging on my wall and I thought, ‘I just have to write a script like that. I love those movies.'”
In the documentary The Sixth Sense: Reflections from the SetShyamalan says he has always been fascinated by the spirit world – evidence of this can be found in his graduation film, Praying with Angerwhere the protagonist is visited by the ghost of his father.
“I was a very fearful child. When we visited people, shortly after entering their homes, I would say [à mes parents] : “OK, it’s time to go.” […] I had this in mind when I started writing the script. And it’s a universal topic: in every country in the world, there are ghost stories. I wanted to tell such a story. The first draft was full of clichés and bad dialogue, familiar narrative arcs…”
It wasn’t until the fourth or fifth draft that Shyamalan came up with the idea for the character of Cole, a child who feels so much “compassion,” as the filmmaker put it, that he acts as a magnet for ghosts who still have unfinished business in this world.
An exciting scenario
David Vogel, who was president of production at Disney, of which Miramax was a subsidiary, was thrilled with the script, which he paid $3 million for, and also agreed to have Shyamalan direct the film himself. This, without having asked permission from his superiors. His act of faith cost him his job.
As for Bruce Willis, he “owed a movie” to Disney after a previous project failed to see the light of day, partly through his fault. The studio decided that this film would be The Sixth Sense. Impressed by the script, the star of Die Hard (crystal trap) got involved willingly. In fact, Willis threw all his weight behind Shyamalan for the hiring of Toni Collette for the role of Lynn, the mother of the little hero.
In a 2019 interview with VarietyShyamalan explains: “Toni showed up with her head shaved, and I forget if it was for fun or for a movie. She did such a great audition… I didn’t want to show the video to the studio executives for fear they would worry about her appearance, and I just said, ‘I want the actress from Muriel’s Wedding [Muriel].” Bruce supported me and chimed in, “Oh, I love it. Muriel’s Wedding!” So we had [Toni] without the studio seeing her audition. Toni actually wears a wig throughout the film; I believe it was one of her wigs from Velvet Goldmine. »
In the central role of Cole, Haley Joel Osment did not fit at all the image that Shyamalan had of the character when he wrote him. In fact, the writer-director had in mind a child with dark hair and pale skin: an appearance that made the character close to the ghosts that torment him.
With his cherubic features and blond hair, Osment was the exact opposite of that. Never mind…
“When Haley came in and read the scene, I knew it was him within a second. It was like a certainty that was beyond me,” Shyamalan recalled in the same interview.
The film was shot in Philadelphia, and several sets were built in a dilapidated convention center that has since been demolished. VarietyOsment describes the place in these terms: “Long deserted corridors, a kind of feeling at Shining [Shining, l’enfant lumière] emanating from the place… I think JFK gave a speech there, during an election campaign in 1960. It was very old and ornate, and there were these cavernous, marble stairs that went down very deep… Yes… it was really spooky.”
It was in this improvised studio that Cole’s room was created. Retaining the lessons of one of his “thinking films”, namely The ExorcistShyamalan transformed this set into a real cold room, in order to generate real steam when a ghost visits the child. However, the most ingenious clue that a supernatural manifestation is underway lies in the targeted use of the color red.
The film has many iconic scenes. There is obviously the one where Cole reveals his “gift”, and of course the one where Malcolm finally realizes that he is dead. On this subject, this concept was not invented by Shyamalan, far from it: in literature, Ambrose Bierce already used it in 1890, in his short story An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (What Happened on Owl Creek Bridge).
For the record, what is perhaps the most memorable sequence in the film is more emotional than supernatural. It is the one where Cole confesses everything to Lynn, while they are stuck in the car. In order to make it clear to his mother that he is telling the truth, Cole tells Lynn things that only she knows about her own deceased mother.
HAS Vanity FairToni Collette confided in 2023: “I felt this scene in my gut.”
The range of emotions that Toni Collette successively modulates in this sequence is of extraordinary power.
Haunted by success
For his subsequent films, Shyamalan would alternate between shades of horror, science fiction and oblique superhero stories. However, The Sixth Sense was his first and last consensual success, his other feature films having all proven to be variously divisive… often because of the use of a “big revelation” sometimes bordering on unintentional self-parody.
Added to this is the now deliberately – and inexplicably – fixed direction of the actors, miles away from the poignant naturalness of The Sixth Sense. In any case, none of this diminishes the cinematic value of this 1999 triumph, which amassed more than $670 million and received six Oscar nominations: best feature film, direction, original screenplay, supporting actor (Osment) and actress (Collette), and editing.
The paradox is that this film, which allowed M. Night Shyamalan’s freedom became a prison. Indeed, everything he has proposed since has been unfavorably compared to The Sixth Sense. His next film, Unbreakable (The indestructible), has rightly become a cult classic, but has never acquired the resonance comparable to that, immediate and lasting, of its predecessor.
Like Cole who “sees people who are dead,” M. Night Shyamalan is haunted, but he, by the ghost of his past stroke of genius.
The film “The Sixth Sense” is available on Disney+ and on VOD on most platforms.