10 Best Films With Unreliable Narrators

It is easy to forget how ground-breaking the twist in The Sixth Sense was, as it is now so well-known. Following his attack, we are never shown protagonist Malcolm recovering or having any kind of interaction with his wife, but we accept this as our mind makes sense of the gaps in the best way that it can. Malcolm simply believes that his relationship with his wife has drifted apart, and because we are only shown glimpses of his time with her, we do not question this. If we were to see an entire day with the couple it may have become more obvious what was happening, but we can accept that a meal or a shared moment in their living room could justifiably occur without talking.

Cole does not do anything to further raise our suspicions, as he simply converses with Malcolm as you would expect a patient to talk to his doctor. It is only when the twist is revealed that you realise no one else has spoken to Malcolm in the film and because the story has always been told from his point of view you are never given the opportunity to see anything odd. We assume that the way Cole perceives Malcolm is the same as everyone else does, when if we had been shown the perspective of other characters, Cole’s behaviour would have revealed the twist instantly.