Language of Film: The Sixth Sense

M. Night Shyamalan is one of my favorite directors and his ability to create a great movie is shown in The Sixth Sense. To me, this was his crowning achievement whether it was choosing great actors like Haley Joel Osment and Bruce Willis, or conveying an amazing story through all aspects of film making.
To me one of greatest talents in literary aspects of his films is symbolism. One prominent symbols in The Sixth Sense is the color red. Some examples of this are the church doors, Cole's sweater, Cole's fort, the cellar doorknob, etc. To me the best way to describe what it means is a warning, a way to repel the ghosts that are trying to communicate with Cole. A contrast to this is how green was used as a symbol for safety. For instance, when Cole's mother saves him from being locked in the attic she was wearing a bright green sweater. When I noticed this I instantly made a connection to Shyamalan's later film, The Village. However, the "safe" color in that movie is yellow.
Although this film was not necessarily a horror movie it still had great use of suspense. Even though we knew that Cole had the ability to see ghost for a fairly long time. We never got to see how his ability worked until half way through the film. When we notice the cold breath and the mood of the music changes it's as if we feel the same chill as the characters. This film still keeps me on the edge of my seat even though I've seen it once before.

One of my favorite scenes is when Cole is at a birthday party and he is forced into a closet that has voices coming out of it. If you watch it, notice M's use of the color red.