For those of you wishing to wash 'The Happening' taste out of your mouth, there won't be a better way than with this high-def Blu-Ray release of M. Night Shyamalan's first great success 'The Sixth Sense'.
It's been almost ten years since 'The Sixth Sense' became an incredible word-of-mouth triumph and M. Night Shyamalan is floundering with 'The Happening', child actor Haley Joel Osment has virtually disappeared from acting and Bruce Willis seems to only be surviving by dusting off an old franchise; how fickle the years can be.
The film, of course, is mostly well known for it's big reveal ending, a twist that became synonymous with Shyamalan's now marquee brand of suspense - as well as having studios scramble for their own twist-ending pictures. The best of these would be 'The Others' and the worst would be Shyamalan's own 'The Village'.
Yet, watching the film years later knowing full well what twist was ahead, the film still scores strongly for a number of other reasons.
Despite some lapses in logic, Shyamalan's script is a study in subtle, screw-tightening tension as well as completely buyable family drama and precocious child speak. This combined with two great pairings, Haley Joel Osment and Bruce Willis and Haley Joel Osment and Toni Collette give the pic an emotional weight that’s surprising for what's seemingly just another ghost story.
Certainly, Haley Joel Osment deserves most of the credit as he's a verifiable revelation in the pic and with another lesser child actor, the film simply wouldn't have worked like it did. I honestly don't think a synopsis is justified here as either you've seen it and now how it proceeds or you haven't seen it in which case you need to go in completely cold.
It's odd to watch 'The Happening' and follow it up with 'The Sixth Sense' as the latter is so expertly directed and staged, the complete opposite of the former made nine years later that one starts to wonder if Shyamalan himself was a victim of what might be one of his own plots - his brain resting on a dusty shelf somewhere as an evil doppelganger tries his best to mimic his talents.
From the introductory scenes of Bruce Willis' child psychiatrist coming face to face with an old patient to Joel Osment's scene in the kitchen where all the cabinets are suddenly open and his main worry is what his mother thinks, the film is one chilling sequence after the next, all done with only a minimum of actually seeing violence on screen.
Like Shyamalan's hero Hitchcock, he realizes some of the more white-knuckling scenes are best played at a tease.
The 1.85:1 1080p image is consistently solid and, despite the distinctly subdued autumn palette, marks a clear upgrade over the DVD. Intentionally shot with a gloom and doom atmosphere (where even the indoor sequences seem to have clouds hanging just overhead), shadows and blacks look good and definition and clarity is spot on. Not a pic to wow people with in high-def, it's nevertheless a solid entry. The same can be said for the uncompressed audio which makes great use of James Newton Howard's score and the intricate hair-raising subtleties of the rears.
Special features seem to be carried over from the ‘Vista’ series DVD. The 40-minute 'Reflections from the Set' is mostly typical behind-the-scenes footage stuff but Shyamalan has a few interesting tidbits. 'Between Two Worlds' is a featurette on how movies in general handle the supernatural.
‘Moving Pictures: The Storyboard Process’ looks at Shyamalan and storyboard artist Brick Mason and how they put together a visual script as they call it. ‘Reaching the Audience’ is a short 3-minute gander at the film’s surprising box office success. ‘Rules and Clues’ looks at the rules of the supernatural as it applies to the film and ‘Music and Design’ focuses on James Newton Howard’s score.
Four deleted scenes with intro from Shyamalan, trailer and tv spots and a $10 dollar rebate for owners of the DVD round out the extras.
‘The Sixth Sense’ is a solid catalog release from Disney with a nice high-def audio/video presentation and a few decent special features. I'm not sure it screams for an upgrade from DVD but if you're a big fan or never got it on DVD, this now modern classic on Blu-Ray comes recommended.
The Sixth Sense [Blu-ray] is now available at Amazon . Visit the DVD database for more information.
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