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As a person who loves
twists and turns in his movies, even I am appalled at the
number of movies that have lined up to capture some of what I call
"The Sixth Sense magic." Not that I thought The
Sixth Sense was all that magical, but it did show film makers
that the moviegoing public was ready for a twisted ending that left
them without that warm, fuzzy feeling. Sure, we've had twist endings
since the golden days of film, but usually the twist left our villain
gasping for air, or our hero basking in his brilliance at foiling
the big plot. The only exception to this that I can think of off the
top of my head is Body Heat--and we remember what a stir
that movie caused. Anyway, The Others takes a page from The
Sixth Sense book of the kaboom ending. We glide helplessly through
the movie filled with these strange characters wondering how they
all fit into the fabric of the film. Children that are allergic to
the light live in an old mansion with their overprotective mother,
who insists that every door be locked behind her so that the children
don't get exposed to even the tiniest speck of light. Their father
is gone and presumably lost somewhere on the European front (the movie
is set on the English Isle of Jersey during the end of WW II). This
leaves our nervous mother to tend to the children by herself, with
the ever-departing cast of caretakers and maids. Nobody, it seems,
wants to hang out very long on this foggy island with the Missus and
her two ill children. Is it her overbearing grouchiness, or the intensity
of creeping around like church mice in near darkness (the woman of
the house gets unbearable migraines of there are loud noises) and
having to live with the crazy rules set forth by Mrs. Stewart (Nicole
Kidman)? We don't know, but they don't like to hang around, apparently.
Then comes the spooky trio to take the place of the vanished help.
Unfortunately, they are the ruination of the entire movie. Rather
than being scary and creepy, they are like the visiting cousins on
a bad episode of The Munsters. They're goofy and stereotypical.
It's almost as if you can see them tenting their hands and peering
ominously over their outstretched fingertips. It's completely silly,
and takes away any illusion that you are watching anything but a stupid
ghost story. It's a shame, really, as there are instances of good
creepiness to be found in this film. Rather than keeping the mystery
and disorientation alive, these characters supply us with narration
and an outsider's view of the situation that takes away from the sense
of claustrophobia and isolation that we are supposed to be feeling.
The film itself looks different when they are in scenes. It's like
the director (the same guy that directed Abre Los Ojos) handed
over the reigns to his less-talented little brother for one quarter
of the movie. Oh, well. Then the twist ending comes, and our cartoon
support cast ruins it once again. The filmmakers should have just
stuck with Kidman and her children, or at least cast the day players
a little better. They had a real opportunity here to make a really
psychologically scary movie, but they backed off too much and ended
up robbing it of any real substance or chills. Then the end comes.
Surprise, I'm The Sixth Sense! [DVD]
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