Great Character: Cole Sear (“The Sixth Sense”)

The Great Character theme for the month: Supernatural. Today: Cole Sear from the movie The Sixth Sense written by M. Night Shyamalan.

The “ThrillerDelphia” native screenwriter and director M. Night Shyamalan raised his profile 100-fold on feature film number two with Bruce Willis, Steven Spielberg’s go-to married producer duo Kathleen Kennedy and Frank Marshall, one of the all-time most popular plot twists and the catch phrase of 1999: “I see dead people.” Shyamalan told his ghost story The Sixth Sense around a campfire that circled the globe with a $40 million budget that manifested itself magnificently into a $672,806,292 box office total.

Fifteen years later, The Sixth Sense has certainly aged well critically, currently holding an illustrious 8.2 rating on IMDB.com and an incredible #163 standing among IMDB’s Top 250 ranked motion pictures. Aside from its cosmic gift definition, The Sixth Sense could also have meant an accurate prediction of its total Academy Award nominations, six, including the coveted Best Picture slot. But heartstrings were also masterfully moved by Shyamalan’s directorial puppeteering of child actor Haley Joel Osment, in his Oscar nominated role as spooked afterlife observer Cole Sear

The Sixth Sense IMDB:

A boy who communicates with spirits that don’t know they’re dead seeks the help of a disheartened child psychologist.

Little Boy Cole has big boy issues: a missing father remembered through memento prescription eye-wear (minus the lenses) and a bulky wristwatch, an increasingly stressed single mom, a completely shallow pool of friends, having to practically answer to the name “Freak” and the complex task of interacting with deceased people who have died in every environment Cole finds himself in.

COLE SEAR: And the tiny hairs on your arm, you know when they stand up? That’s them. When they get mad… it gets cold.

Cole’s only refuge from his morbid educational and domestic life comes in the form of Dr. Malcolm Crowe (Bruce Willis), a loving husband who has been recently shot by an ex-patient. Separated by decades of age, Cole and Dr. Crowe manage to unify under the guise of a doctor/patient bond that becomes therapeutic for the social isolation that they both are suffering from.

DR. MALCOLM CROWE: You think I’m sad?

Cole nods.

DR. MALCOLM CROWE: What makes you think that?
COLE SEAR: Your eyes told me.

Cole’s supernatural sixth sense is pushing an emotional wedge between his ability to be understood by his petrified matriarch. When cupboards and drawers mysteriously open “by themselves” and her family ear looms go missing, the last thing Cole’s mother wants to hear is the blame placed on poltergeists.

To magnify the disunity that Cole feels between himself and everyone that is unprepared to believe his haunted secret even further is Cole’s very visible and violent scratches that aren’t the suicidal markings that they could appear to be. More than ever, Cole needs a nonjudgmental ear to accept his supernatural obstacles as fact.

COLE SEAR: I was thinking… you’re nice, but you can’t help me.

Cole fears potential abandonment from his frustrated mother and a lack of protection from his paranormal persecutors. But if Cole has benefited from his perpetual state of reclusive disengagement in any ways, it would be that his maturity level matches adults three times his age and he has acquired an observational radar to decode the body language and vague verbal language of others — in real time. One key example is after giving Dr. Malcolm Crowe the chance to prove his analysis is fueled by good intentions; Cole recognizes that Crowe’s metaphorical bedtime story is laced with literal anecdotes plucked from his own family feud. This personal reveal ignites compassionate synergy with the young sixth senser.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsNjQhyvRnU

After seeking the church for holy protection during the day and a zipped tight tent for solace during the bedtime witching hours, Cole becomes more open towards believing in Dr. Crowe’s ability help. Dr. Crowe never gives up on the reluctant Cole Sear, which leads to Cole not giving up on making a push for a mother/son breakthrough on the taboo subject of beyond-the-grave visitation.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qqVQcZxpqA

For his struggle to accept his loss of innocence at such a young age, for his lonely journey from victim towards spiritual healing and for the perseverance of his sensitive, caring nature in a world encapsulated by ugly behavior — Cole Sear is a super GREAT CHARACTER in the supernatural realm.

For a story that started out as a cop trying to track down a serial killer, The Sixth Sense evolved into quite an assured, restrained thriller. Lots of quiet moments of human interaction. Characters talking. Sharing emotions. And at its enigmatic heart: Cole Sear.

Thank you, Jason, for this post. What’s your favorite bit from the movie? Please join us in comments to discuss The Sixth Sense.

You may follow Jason on Twitter: @A2Jason. 

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