The Suspense In The Sixth Sense

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The Suspense In The Sixth Sense

The Sixth Sense is a psychological thriller. It follows a very simple

set of conventions that are associated with all psychological

thrillers. The hero or anti-hero is always present in psychological

thrillers and is there for the audience to relate to. Vulnerable

characters are often depicted as small children. Children are seen as

innocent and un-knowing, it is easy for the audience to be aware of

what the children are going through as they were all one once.

Suspense is always built up with dramatic and scary music. Using this

convention allows the audience time to realise that something is going

to happen. When the audience views a psychological thriller they

immediately expect to see these conventions appear throughout the

film. They know that if they go and see this genre of film that they

are going to be held in suspense and that many of the characters will

have to face dangerous or unusual situations.

Many films fall into the genre of Psychological thriller. These have

proved to be very successful and have had a very good audience

reception. Many thrillers are also crossed with the horror genre, e.g.

What Lies Beneath, Sleepy Hollow and The Haunting. The film that I

think is most closely connected to the Sixth Sense is The Hand That

Rocks The Cradle. This also contains the very important convention

audience foreknowledge, which is a defining aspect of many thrillers.

The Hand that Rocks The Cradle was popular because all the way through

the movie the audience knows whom the nanny is and it is just a matter

of waiting to see how she seeks her revenge.

The audience foreknowledge in the Six...

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Haunting), some films do in a very abstract way represent real life

issues e.g. Scream. Serial Killers do exist and so the Scream Trilogy

is not altogether that far away from real life. These types of films

give you an extra scare, as they could have happened. Another popular

genre of film is comedy and so when the two genres are crossed the

films created are usually very well received. The film Scary Movie was

a huge hit in both the UK and America as it made the audience laugh as

well as scare them.

The Sixth Sense was a huge success because it was an original story

and especially because of the twist at the end. It made a large impact

on the audience that went to see it because it was new and exciting.

Although the psychological thriller genre has been around for a long

time, The Sixth Sense revived it.

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