The Sixth Sense

Quite the most terrifying movie ever to feature a kid, this phenomenally spooky psycho-thriller is by some distance the darkest blockbuster offering of the year thus far, and had this most hardened of critics jumping out of his none-more-pale skin.

The Sixth Sense - directed by the inexplicably-named M. Night Shyamalan - teams Bruce Willis up with a child actor, a scenario which will be sufficient to send shudders of apprehension down the spines of anyone who sat through Mercury Rising. However, the film couldn't be further removed from the sickly-sweetness its premise might seem to indicate - and although it's quietly disturbing rather than out-and-out terrifying, Sixth Sense is still replete with enough Hitchcock-derived shock effects to trigger a heart attack.

Willis' masterfully subdued performance is something of a revelation. He's haunted by the suicide of an ex-patient, and entrusted with the nigh-impossible task of redeeming the badly troubled mind of a psychic eight-year-old named Cole. The latter is played by one Haley Joel Osment, who takes a mere 114 minutes to establish himself as easily the most arresting child actor in cinematic history (with the possible exception of The Exorcist's Linda Blair). The kid is one of the most heartbreaking cinematic creations you've ever witnessed in your life: gifted, or more accurately cursed, with supernatural psychic powers.

Willis displays a sensitivity never previously noted, and there is an under-developed but highly affecting subplot which concerns the deterioration of his marriage (to Olivia Williams). Toni Collette is as intense as ever in the role of little Cole's mother, a frayed bag of nerves who finds parenting more difficult with each passing day, and the entire team pull together to excellent effect right from the word go. And if Sixth Sense - of necessity - fades out in slightly sentimental fashion, it's got one of those stunning revelatory endings, which almost made me want to watch the film twice.

It ain't the kind of film you're advised to watch alone on video at night, but Sixth Sense cast a spell that lasted for days, in my case. Whatever you do, don't bring the kids.