There are few things as satisfying in a movie as a great plot twist. Everything clicks into place and it feels like the laws of physics are being rewritten just to delight you. A lot of movies have great plot twists, like The Empire Strikes Back and Psycho, but in some movies the twist is so good and so big that it overshadows the movie itself.

That’s what happened with The Sixth Sense, which I think is a shame because it’s a really good movie and its plot twist is much more than a gimmick. The twist is integral to the story the film was telling about its characters. I'm going to take a close look at how The Sixth Sense approached its plot twist. I want to see what the movie is doing and what lessons screenwriters and filmmakers can take from it.

The Twist

It shouldn’t be a plot twist for me to reveal this article will have spoilers, but if you’ve somehow stumbled into it and you don’t know the plot twist in The Sixth Sense, consider yourself warned. Of course the big twist I’m talking about is at the end of the film when Bruce Willis’ character, Dr. Malcolm Crowe, realizes that he actually died at the beginning of the movie. That’s what people generally remember about the film: “He’s been dead the whole time.” But we need a little more context than that to really understand what’s going on here.

The movie starts with Malcolm who is a child psychologist and his wife Anna celebrating an award Malcolm got from the mayor for helping children, which Anna says is the thing Malcolm cares most about in the world. Even she comes second to that. Their celebrations are cut short when they’re confronted by Vincent, a disturbed man who was Malcolm’s patient as a child. Vincent says that Malcolm failed him, which is key to understanding this whole movie. The thing Malcolm cares about most is helping kids, and he failed to help this kid. Don’t forget that. Vincent shoots him, but we think Malcolm survived because he’s still walking around doing stuff. The main thing he’s doing is trying to help Cole, played by Haley Joel Osment. Cole has the same problems as Vincent. So if Malcolm can help Cole, it’s like he’s helping Vincent. And Malcolm does help Cole. Cole is being haunted by dead people, and Malcolm helps him realize that the dead people aren’t trying to hurt him. Rather they’re coming to him because they need help. In the end Malcolm realizes he himself has been dead the whole time. He’s one of those people who was coming to Cole for help.

The plot twist is not about the plot

The reason I’m going back through the story like this is I think the first lesson from The Sixth Sense is that the plot twist is not about the plot. Obviously it involves the plot, hence “plot twist.” But it’s not about the plot. It’s about the characters’ stories. With plot I mean “the events as they actually happened,” and with story I mean “what the characters went through and how they changed.”

The plot twist is integral to the journey that Malcolm’s character goes on through the story. At the end he says to his wife, “I think I can go now. I just needed to do a couple of things. I just needed to help someone. I think I did.” He wasn’t sticking around after he died just to set up a cool twist. It was because his character needed redemption. He goes on to tell Anna, “And I needed to tell you something. You were never second. Ever. I love you.” He also needed redemption for making Anna feel like she came second to his work. It ties the story together and gives us a sense of closure.

You could have a twist that’s just about the plot, but the emotional aspect is what elevates this into something truly special. You can also think of this emotional layer as an insurance policy. Because you can poke holes in The Sixth Sense, just like you can poke holes in most movies with twists, but if there is a satisfying emotional story the audience won’t want to poke holes.

What kind of twist?

Another thing to note about the plot twist in The Sixth Sense is that there isn’t only one. But I should probably define plot twist. My definition of a plot twist is a reveal that changes the audience’s perception of what has occurred. Obviously, the big twist at the end does this, but there’s also a big one in the middle when Cole reveals, “I see dead people.” That’s a twist! It changes how we see what’s happened so far, but this twist also reveals the second thing that twists can do.

The first thing they do is reframe the story that happened before the twist. The second thing they can do is drive the story forward. The back half of the movie is set up by that twist. It gives us the question, “What do the dead people want from Cole?” Finding the answer to that question drives the story in the second half of the movie.

There’s a lesson here for screenwriters: Don’t just use twists at the end to reframe what came before. Use them in the middle of the movie to change the audience’s perception of what this movie is and drive the story forward.

The cherry on top

As I was rewatching The Sixth Sense I was also struck by the fact that for a movie that’s become synonymous with plot twists, it doesn’t depend on the big twist at the end to work as a movie. It needs the middle twist, Cole seeing dead people, but not the one at the end. For most of the film, it portrays itself as a story about a child psychologist trying to help a troubled kid who is revealed to see dead people, and it could actually just be that. That could be the whole movie. In fact, it actually was just that in the early drafts. M. Night Shyamalan didn’t write the big twist at the end until later drafts.

I’m not saying that the movie would have been as good without the twist, but it still would have been a movie with a pretty cool story. The big twist was the cherry on top. I think a lot of times screenwriters run into trouble because they make the entire movie depend on the twist to work. It’s kind of a one-trick pony. You can do that, there are movies that don’t work without the twist, like The Usual Suspects or The Prestige, because those movies are set up as big mysteries with a mind-blowing answer. But if you’re going to do that, you have to blow minds. You’re raising the audience’s expectations and can’t disappoint them. Whereas The Sixth Sense lets the surprise sneak up on you a little, which helps make it feel so powerful.

The key to foreshadowing

Speaking of the surprise sneaking up on the audience, you can’t talk about plot twists without talking about foreshadowing. Foreshadowing is giving the audience glimpses of the twist without giving the whole thing away. It’s important for a few reasons.

First, foreshadowing makes the twist feel intentional. You didn’t just throw this random thing in at the end. You had a vision.

Second, foreshadowing builds anticipation. The audience knows something is going on, and they get excited to find out what.

Finally, the anticipation leads to a feeling of satisfaction when the twist is revealed.

The Sixth Sense is full of foreshadowing. Some of it we can actively notice—like when Malcolm keeps trying to open a locked door or when the temperature drops—and some of it we might not consciously notice, but something just feels off, like Malcolm not interacting directly with anyone besides Cole. Your brain knows something weird is going on but can’t put its finger on it. The need to understand drives you to keep watching.

Foreshadowing a plot twist is important, but it’s not easy. Too little, and the audience won’t be intrigued; too much, and you give away the twist. Plus, if you’re focusing on the foreshadowing, you risk your story being driven by the plot twist, not by the characters. That can make it feel mechanical. So how do you foreshadow effectively?

The answer isn’t to measure out the perfect amount; it’s to control the questions that your audience is asking about the story. Make them wonder about something other than whatever your twist is. Make them think that other question is the point. The audience will then try to connect the breadcrumbs you leave them to that question. You don’t have to stress out so much about giving the twist away, so you can focus more on the actual story.

In The Sixth Sense the audience is not wondering “Is Malcolm dead?” Most of the questions aren’t even about Malcolm at all, they’re about Cole. In the first half of the movie it’s “What’s wrong with Cole?” and in the second half it’s “What do the dead want with Cole?” Those are great questions. They’re compelling enough to engage the audience, so that’s what they’re thinking about. They’re not trying to solve the mystery of Malcolm. The biggest questions about Malcolm are “Will he be able to help this kid and redeem himself?” and “Will he lose his wife?”

Twist and answer the questions

In some ways you can think of these questions as misdirection, because they’re keeping the audience off the scent of the twist, but just because they’re misdirection doesn’t make them unimportant. This is where it gets really tricky. You have to answer those questions and make the answers related to the twist or the audience will feel betrayed. Because you as the writer are the one who made them ask those questions in the first place.

If you don’t give good answers, the audience will think you misled them and wasted their time. The “and” in that sentence is really important because you did mislead them to some extent, but if you don’t waste their time, then they’ll love you for it. If you do waste their time, they’ll hate you for it.

So let’s look back at those questions we’re asking in the second half of the movie and see if the answers are related to the big twist of Malcolm being dead.

The big question was “What do the dead want with Cole?” They want his help. Does that have to do with the twist? Yes. Because Cole had to help Malcolm find redemption in order for Malcolm to move on. Malcolm helped Cole deal with his problem, which redeemed Malcolm from not being able to help Vincent earlier in the movie.

The other big question was “Will Malcolm be able to redeem himself?” Yes, and that’s also connected to the twist because the redemption is what lets him move on. There was also the question of  “Will Malcolm lose his wife?” He does, because accepting his death means he’s going to move on. This acceptance connects it directly to the twist. However, losing his wife at the end is actually a good thing for both of them. He has closure, and she’ll be able to move on with her life without him haunting her.

The big twist

So what’s my big twist for you here at the end? I don’t think I have one. I just want to say that a great twist is hard to pull off, but that’s what rewriting is for. I mentioned earlier that M. Night Shyamalan didn’t add the big reveal at the end until a later draft, and I think it’s worth bringing up again. Just because your script isn't where it needs to be yet doesn't mean you can't keep working on it and find that element that's going to bring it over the top.