Rating of
2.5/4
A bit slow, but the twist at the end is a must see
The M.O.W. - wrote on 08/02/08
"Dr. Malcolm Crowe" (Bruce Willis), a psychatrist shot months ago by a former patient who broke into his house, is coming to the aid of a disturbed child (Haley Joel Osment). His case is not unique at first, but "Dr. Crowe" slowly brings out what has been eating at the kid -- the kid has the ability to talk with people who died, but have not crossed over. In layman's terms, the young boy is a psychic.
"Dr. Crowe" begins to look at the case of the man who shot him months ago, and discovers some similarities with his current. Now, the psychiatrist must become a spirit guide until the young boy is comfortable with his situation. However, the boy helps him out with an unusual problem he has.
First of all, do you know how hard it is to write a synopsis without giving any clues to a movie that has hidden clues pointing to the true nature of a main character?
The movie is pretty slow and has, in my opinion, some quite tame scares throughout. In fact, this movie isn't really a horror, but a mystery that the audience is given blatant clues that don't seem to be clues at the time they appear. These clues, specifically one in particular, are hidden nicely, but they are shown to the audience.
Willis and Osment put forth strong performances. Osment is pretty freaky in the scenes where the audience is not shown the ghosts who are speaking with him. A really spooky performance is former New Kids On The Block singer Donnie Wahlber, who you won't recognize until you see his name in the closing credits. Other performers in this movie also has good performances, but are not seen much on screen or their character is not well developed.
The music is pretty typical for movies. It is used to build tension or to help with scaring you. Because I have some knowledge in television production, I know that music can be used to help build tension, so the music clues me in that something is going to happen before it does.
The special effects are mostly make-up on the actors who portray the ghosts. Some are a bit shocking, but there's nothing too over the top.
M. Night Shamalan (I'm pretty sure I butchered that name) must have channeled the spirit of Alfred Hitchcock, because this has the feel of the movies made by the "Master of Suspense". He expertly mixed in the clues to the true nature of one of the characters, which I won't reveal because it might just tell you the surprise twist.
I would have to say to put this as a strong second choice on the "Must See" list the next time you go to your local video rental place or log onto Netflix.
