‘The Sixth Sense’ With Sean Fennessey, Chris Ryan, and Jason Concepcion

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Rewatchables - ‘The Sixth Sense’ with Sean Fennessey, Chris Ryan, and Jason Concepcion

Released on September 10, 2024, “The Rewatchables” podcast from The Ringer delves into movies that captivate audiences enough to warrant multiple viewings. In this episode, hosts Bill Simmons, Sean Fennessey, and Jason Concepcion dissect the 1999 thriller “The Sixth Sense,” exploring its enduring impact, storytelling mechanics, and the careers it influenced.

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1. Personal Experiences and Initial Reactions

Jason Concepcion shares his personal connection to the film, highlighting it as a top three theater experience. Working at movie theaters during its release, he recalls viewing the film without any prior knowledge and being profoundly affected by its emotional depth and shocking twist.

“I was waylaid by it.” [06:16]

Sean Fennessey discusses his first viewing in 1999, amidst a stellar year for cinema with releases like "The Matrix" and "Fight Club." He emphasizes the film’s role in showcasing Philadelphia’s character, noting its rich setting and Bruce Willis's evolving career.

“...it was inconceivable to go to a bar or go up to a dude and be like, guess what happens at the end of this movie.” [07:20]

Bill Simmons admits missing the theatrical release due to commitments but reflects on how spoilers, particularly from media personalities like Frank DiGiacomo on The Daily Show, tainted his initial understanding of the film.

“Frank DiGiacomo... spoiled that Bruce Willis was dead.” [09:28]

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2. The Twist Ending and Storytelling Mechanics

The trio delves deep into the film's renowned twist ending, comparing it to a meticulously crafted magic trick. Sean Fennessey draws parallels between the movie’s structure and classic magic performances, praising its seamless execution.

“It's such a perfect... magic trick.” [12:30]

Jason Concepcion echoes this sentiment, appreciating how the film plants subtle hints that only become apparent upon rewatching, enhancing its rewatchability.

“...it's still a remarkable movie.” [73:15]

Bill Simmons reflects on the effectiveness of the twist, noting how it redefines the viewing experience and underscores the film's clever construction.

“But it radically alters how you experience it.” [72:33]

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3. Impact on M. Night Shyamalan’s Career

Bill Simmons traces Shyamalan’s career trajectory, highlighting “The Sixth Sense” as his breakthrough film. He outlines Shyamalan’s early works and subsequent projects, acknowledging both his successes and missteps.

“It's a unique and weird career.” [36:17]

Jason Concepcion provides a critical overview of Shyamalan’s filmography post-“The Sixth Sense,” praising films like "Unbreakable" and "Signs" while critiquing others like "The Village" and "Lady in the Water."

“I was almost offended by that movie.” [37:12]

The discussion emphasizes Shyamalan’s resilience and ability to reinvent himself, particularly through collaborations with production companies like Blumhouse.

“...he has figured out something... that will allow him to continue to be successful.” [73:37]

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4. Casting Choices and Performances

Haley Joel Osment’s performance as Cole Sear is lauded as a pivotal element of the film’s success. The hosts commend his emotional depth and ability to convey complex feelings at a young age.

“He just crushes it and gives you a range of emotions.” [29:37]

Toni Collette is recognized for her powerful portrayal of Cole’s mother, Lynne Cyr. Her only Oscar nomination, Collette’s performance remains a standout aspect of the film.

“She's just an amazing actress.” [33:26]

Bruce Willis’ portrayal of Dr. Malcolm Crowe is scrutinized, with critiques on his convincingness as a child psychologist and the subtle cues of his character’s true state.

“This is definitely a global smash.” [11:32]

Donny Wahlberg receives mixed reviews. While his transformation for the role is acknowledged, his limited screen time and performance are critiqued.

“This is the sound of your ride.” [65:22]

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5. Technical Aspects and Cinematography

Tak Fujimoto’s cinematography is praised for enhancing the film’s eerie atmosphere. The use of color, particularly red, is highlighted as a significant storytelling tool.

“The use of red is a huge thing.” [46:32]

The hosts discuss the meticulous staging of scenes, such as the iconic kitchen drawer sequence and the locked crawl space, which effectively build suspense and foreshadow the twist.

“It’s such an amazing jump scare.” [21:07]

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6. Rewatchability and Lasting Appeal

The panel debates the film’s status as a rewatchable classic. While Jason Concepcion finds value in dissecting the narrative structure and emotional moments upon subsequent viewings, Sean Fennessey questions its emotional resonance compared to other rewatchable films.

“From a structural standpoint, it's just really interesting...” [71:15]

Bill Simmons concurs, noting that even knowing the twist can offer a different but still engaging experience.

“I was entertained but not emotionally involved.” [71:01]

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7. Critiques and Nitpicks

Issues such as continuity errors, implausible plot developments, and character inconsistencies are addressed. For instance, the logistics of Cole bringing a VHS tape to his father’s funeral and the absence of thorough police investigation are highlighted as narrative flaws.

“No extensive police interview... wild.” [67:02]

The hosts also point out minor errors, like discrepancies in facial expressions during emotional scenes, which detract from the film’s overall polish.

“When Cole turns away, his face is dry with no trace of a tear.” [68:58]

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8. Cultural and Industry Impact

“The Sixth Sense” is contextualized within the landscape of late 90s cinema, alongside films like "The Usual Suspects," "Fight Club," and "Scream." Its success is attributed to its unique approach to storytelling and the emergence of twist-heavy narratives.

“It's a case for Haley Joel, who obviously has revived his career...” [73:21]

The discussion also touches on the evolution of sleeper hits, with the hosts noting the shift from theatrical long-tail success to instant digital phenomena.

“There's no long tail anymore.” [74:34]

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9. Memorable Quotes and Scenes

Key dialogues and their significance are explored, with "I see dead people" identified as the film’s most iconic line. The emotional climaxes, particularly the car conversation between Cole and his mother, are lauded for their depth and execution.

“I see dead people. Could this work as a 10 episode Netflix show in 2019?” [69:48]

Jason Concepcion appreciates how rewatching the film unveils the intricacies of its dialogue and scene construction.

“It's still a remarkable movie.” [71:15]

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10. Final Thoughts and Conclusions

The episode concludes with reflections on the nostalgic value of revisiting “The Sixth Sense” and its place in the pantheon of rewatchable films. The hosts acknowledge both its strengths and shortcomings, ultimately affirming its significance in film history.

Sean Fennessey expresses nostalgia for the era of its release, noting how cultural interactions with pop culture have evolved since then.

“...it really was a different time.” [75:26]

Jason Concepcion emphasizes the film’s structural brilliance, while Bill Simmons appreciates its emotional depth gained through multiple viewings.

“It holds up really well.” [29:36]

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Notable Quotes

• Jason Concepcion [06:16]: “...spoiler we discover that Dr. Malcolm Crowe was actually dead the whole time I was waylaid by it.”
• Sean Fennessey [12:30]: “It's such a perfect... magic trick.”
• Bill Simmons [27:20]: “The sixth sense is a fantastic example of how a twist can redefine the entire narrative.”
• Jason Concepcion [71:42]: “...from a structural standpoint, it's just really interesting to see how right in front of you the tells are.”
• Sean Fennessey [75:26]: “It really, really was a different time.”

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Conclusion

“The Sixth Sense” episode of “The Rewatchables” provides an in-depth analysis of one of cinema’s most talked-about thrillers. Through personal anecdotes, critical examination, and thoughtful discussion, the hosts illuminate both the film’s enduring allure and its complex legacy within the industry. Whether revisiting the emotional highs or scrutinizing its narrative flaws, the episode offers valuable insights for both longtime fans and newcomers alike.

Transcript

[Bill Simmons]

If you're a fan of the inner workings of Hollywood, then check out my podcast the Town on the Ringer Podcast Network. My name is Matt Bellamy. I'm founding partner at Puck and the writer of the what I'm Hearing newsletter. And with my show the Town, I bring you the inside conversation about money and power in Hollywood. Every week we've got three short episodes featuring real Hollywood insiders to tell you what people in town are actually talking about. We'll cover everything from why your favorite show was canceled overnight, which streamer is on the brink of collapse, and which executive is on the hot seat. Disney, Netflix, who's up down, and who will eat lunch in this town again? Follow the Town on Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Chris Ryan]

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[Bill Simmons]

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[Chris Ryan]

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[Jason Concepcion]

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[Bill Simmons]

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[Jason Concepcion]

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[Bill Simmons]

Yep, and it still is. I even work overnight. Huh? Colgate's Optic White Overnight whitening pen works overnight so after one week I can show up confident and reunion ready.

[Jason Concepcion]

And here I was bragging about my kids.

[Bill Simmons]

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[Chris Ryan]

The Rewatchables is brought to you by the Ringer Podcast Network. We have a YouTube channel. It is called Ringer Movies. All of our new episodes go up there as well as a lot of the old classics that are already up there from the last seven years. So please subscribe to that one. You can get the Rewatchables. You can also get the Big Picture with Sean Fantasy and Amanda Dobbins. We have a TikTok account. We have an Instagram. We have an X account. I still call it Twitter whatever you want to call it. Twitter X we have that too. And we also have a gmail address that I want you to send mailbag questions or suggestion suggestions for new categories because we're in our eighth year now. The Rewatchables. So if you want to send us anything, please be nice. It's 2024. Let's be nice to each other. But if you want to send us anything for a possible Mailbag episode later this fall, the rewatchables33mail.com so this is the last non new episode that we're posting in 2024. After that we are going to keep going and going. But I wanted to post one last episode from our Rewatchables 1999 series, which we did five years ago. In 2019, we broke down a bunch of movies. It was a little spin off for the Rewatchables for Luminary, and it was on there for a few years and now we got those episodes back and this is the last one we really need to run. And now it's getting, you know, it's been five years. It'll still hold up. It's still really good. Sean, Fantasy, Chris Ryan, old friend, Jason Concepcion. The three of them breaking it down. One of the best twist movies really, in the last 40 years. I have a complicated relationship with this movie because it makes me mad that I didn't figure out the twist. Usually I'm pretty good at figuring out, wait a second, something doesn't smell right. Wait, why is. And I just, I just missed it. And it really upsets me when I watch it. I watched this a couple weeks ago because I was debating whether we wanted to. To do a brand new episode about this movie or not. And I'm not positive if it's like I want to rewatch this 20 times movie once. You know, the twist. For some people it is because of the filmmaking. It's M. Night Shyamalan's first movie. The Bruce Willis part was the part that was really fascinating to me because he has this run starting with Die Hard and Moonlighting in the late 80s, goes all the way through, makes three Die Hard movies, is in the Last Boy Scout, and then by the time we get to like the 93 range, he's doing Striking Distance, a movie that I really like, by the way, and color Knight. And he's in north and it feels like it's starting to go sideways a little bit. Then he comes rallying back with Pulp Fiction, which we covered a few weeks ago. Die Hard with a Vengeance. And then he just kind of keeps crushing it through the 90s. Is in 12 Monkeys, is in the Fifth Element. He does the Jackal, which some people like. And he does Armageddon, the Siege, and then the Sixth Sense. And it is this 12 year run that's about as good as any A plus Lister from a popcorn movie standpoint. Not quite on a scale of one to Michael Douglas. Not as, maybe as good as the 12 year Michael Douglas run, but really, really good. And this is an important movie for his portfolio. So I think that's why I enjoyed rewatching it the most when I watched it a couple weeks ago. But Sean and CR and Jason will be breaking it down right now on The Rewatchables. Let's go.

[Jason Concepcion]

Cole, what's wrong?

[Bill Simmons]

Don't move. Don't make a sense.

[Jason Concepcion]

I want to tell you my secret. Now I see dead people.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you ever feel the prickly things.

[Jason Concepcion]

On the back of your neck?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, that's them.

[Bill Simmons]

The Sixth Sense, rated PG 13. Starts Friday, August 6th. Jason and Chris, we're here to talk about the Sixth Sense.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

And when we do talk about these movies, we tend to have these very open, breezy conversations at the very top of the show. And one of us always asks, when did you see this movie? This movie is a perfect time to talk about that kind of question. Jason, I think you said that this was a top three in theater experience for you in your life.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, well, I was working at movie theaters at that time and I had heard nothing about this movie. I knew nothing about it. And I watched it and I thought. So I thought the scene with Cole and his mom at the. They're in the traffic jam from the accident. I'm like, oh, this is the climax of the movie. This is emotional. This is amazing. So when spoiler we discover that Dr. Malcolm Crowe was actually dead the whole time I was waylaid by it.

[Sean Fennessey]

It knocked me out as a movie theater employee. Did you see this movie in chunks or did you see it straight through?

[Jason Concepcion]

And then I saw it straight through. I went like it had opened whenever in open August something. And so I went on a Sunday, like the first Sunday on my day off, because I could just get in for free. And I was blown through the back of the theater after it. It was extremely affecting movie. First of all, Toni Collette, I think maybe the best on screen crier of my lifetime.

[Bill Simmons]

Wow.

[Jason Concepcion]

I've never seen anybody cry like that where I'm like, man, am I gonna cry? And so I'm like opened up by that scene with like, you know, the grandma's pendant and the whole thing, and then he's dead. I was just not ready for it. And also, you know, M. Night Shyamalan's schtick is played out by this point, but it was. You just were unprepared for a twist of that level.

[Bill Simmons]

I'm really excited to talk with you guys about the idea of twist endings, that this is a very resonant thing, not just in this movie, but in a lot of movies at this time. Chris, what about you? Did you see this in theaters?

[Sean Fennessey]

I did. 99. Not a fan? No, of course, no. 99 was just such an incredible movie theater year. Blair Witch this, the Matrix, Fight Club. Going to see the movies and having these moments and then I think being pretty respectful of like, I don't know, it was inconceivable to go to a bar or go up to a dude and be like, guess what happens at the end of this movie? Yeah, it's like you really did respect the process. You respected the sanctity of fuck, dude, you gotta go see the Sixth Sense. Just trust me. Like that was it. And that was like a much different way of communicating. Enthusiasm and the word of mouth was much different back then. Just a remarkable experience. Obviously I was like all in because of Philadelphia. This is sort of marked a little bit of a filmmaking renaissance for Philadelphia as a setting with Philadelphia, the movie 12 Monkeys and Sixth Sense and really showed off the city in a cool way. There's a little bit more. I feel like back in the 90s, they just spent a little bit more money on shooting places in different locations. It wasn't all Atlanta or Louisiana, and you can really tell. I think it gives it a lot of character. I was a really, really, you know, super into Bruce Willis, like in the 90s. I just loved his movies. He had such a weird up and down career. And on the surface this seemed almost like, what's Bruce Willis doing in this movie with a kid? Yeah, what's up with this? And then you get introduced to the possibility that you got a new Spielberg on your hands. And that was really the vibe around this movie and around Shyamalan at the time.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I've told this story in the past on other podcasts, but I did not see this movie in movie theaters. This was the August before my senior year of high school and I was at basketball when this was happening and just didn't get to participate.

[Jason Concepcion]

Just dominating.

[Bill Simmons]

Yes. I was working on my silky drop step. Just posting up five six foot dudes at Bruns basketball camp.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just watching college at Brunswick.

[Bill Simmons]

And so I didn't get a chance to see it. What I did see was a segment on the Daily show that fall and there was a comedian slash cultural critic named Frank DiGiacomo. This is back, I believe, in the Craig Kilbourne days of the Daily show. And this motherfucker came on TV and spoiled the movie.

[Sean Fennessey]

Who did?

[Bill Simmons]

Frank DiGiacomo.

[Jason Concepcion]

Unbelievable.

[Bill Simmons]

And it might have been like three weeks, five weeks, I don't know how far afterwards. But you guys remember too, in terms of seeing a movie, that distance between theater to Blockbuster is also a very sacred time. And to your point, Chris, you're right. There was a lot of Respect amongst fans. And this guy went on tv, that is. And spoiled that Bruce Willis was dead.

[Jason Concepcion]

Can I tell you the most 90s sentence ever that is applicable to me? I had the usual song Suspects spoiled for me by a piece in Bikini magazine in which Dave Navarro and his brother did movie reviews. And their blurb for the Usual Suspects was literally just what the ending was. Kensport, Kevin Spacey is Kaiser Sulze. That's all the review was. That's how that movie was spoiled for me as I was traveling to the wild West, Washington D.C. for like the Congressional Students Honor Society.

[Bill Simmons]

So we gotta get Dave Navarro and Frank De Giacomo on a spaceship and send them to fucking Mars. That's what we learned. Let me give you some key data points.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like digiacomo and Navarro would basically be the guys who were like walking out of screenings and being like some interesting third act twists in this movie on like the five minutes after the embargo lifts. Yeah, Dave Navarro invented film Twitter.

[Bill Simmons]

It's really a tough beat. The Sixth Sense was written and directed by, as we mentioned, M. Night Shyamalan. This is his second movie, but definitely his breakthrough. Yeah, very notable producerial credit on this movie. Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy, two people we'll talk about a little bit later on in the show. It of course stars Bruce Willis, Toni Collette, Olivia Williams, Donny Wahlberg, Misha Barton and fourth build, Haley Joel Osment. Which in hindsight is bizarre because man, what an amazing breakthrough. Incredible performance by this kid. And it's funny to see him come forth because he is the star of the movie. Even though Bruce Willis is by far the biggest movie star. This movie was shot by Tak Fujimoto. Tak Fujimoto, Jonathan Demme's longtime cinematographer. Literally one of the most interesting and progressive cinematographers ever. This movie was released by Buena Vista. Disney does not seem like a Disney movie, but it is a Disney movie.

[Sean Fennessey]

So is Spyglass like an offshoot of Disney?

[Bill Simmons]

I believe that's Barry Mendel's production company. Barry Mendel got his hands on this script and sold the movie to Disney.

[Sean Fennessey]

Gotcha.

[Bill Simmons]

It was budgeted at $40 million and it earned $672.8 million around the world. That is what we call a global smash. 86% on rotten tomatoes. As we know, that doesn't matter. This movie was nominated for six Oscars. Best Picture, Best Director, Best Original Screenplay, Best Supporting Actor, Best Supporting Actress and Best Editing. That's a lot for a weird thriller released by a no name guy in the middle of August. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun Times wrote of this movie, I have to admit I was blindsided by the ending. Much like Jason, the solution to many of the film's puzzlements is right there in plain view. And the movie hasn't cheated. But the very boldness of the storytelling carried me right past the crucial hints and right through to the end of the film where everything takes on an intriguing new dimension. Should we talk about twists now?

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, let's do it.

[Sean Fennessey]

I wanted to say up top that upon rewatching it, I don't think I had ever noticed this before. I'm sure there are pieces written about this very. But just believe me when I say I feel like I am coming to this pretty fresh. I didn't notice how much. This movie is very simply a magic trick. And right down to the things that, you know, are the staples of a magic trick of the pledge. Disturbed kid begins talking to a therapist. The turn. The kid can see dead people. The prestige. Turns out the therapist is one of those dead people. It's such a perfect. It's not even like three act structure. It's actually a perfect magic trick. And I had forgotten that they talk about magic tricks in the friggin movie. Yes, and that's sort of the ingenious part of this. We've spent so much time talking about 99 movies and thinking about movies from this period in a lot of ways. I think you could divide them up into two different categories. There's movies that you feel like could be released today, whether it's the Matrix or Fight Club. I think both would have the style and the technical bravado with which they are made. You would just wouldn't blink if they were in theaters today. There's nothing wrong with this film technically, but it's so unencumbered by any other crap. It's just the trick. Yeah, there's no B plot of crime solving until the very end. There's no set pieces with CGI or bad monsters or really all the ghosts are very, very appropriate for the place that they're in. And there's no overarching mythology that you have to weave through to be like, oh yes, obviously the Native Americans who were here did this. So we have to, you know, and now we have to like, it's none of that. It's just a trick. And sometimes a trick is enough.

[Bill Simmons]

So this movie falls into this interesting lineage of movies from the 90s and early 2000s that applied this. Jason already mentioned the Usual Suspects, which was, I would say, probably the first in this run of films. That had the kind of like, oh, shit feeling at the end of the movie. Also among them, seven Fight Club, which we taught what we talk about in 1999, Scream, and then in the 2000s, Memento and the others.

[Sean Fennessey]

You could. Would you throw Crying Game in there?

[Bill Simmons]

Wow.

[Jason Concepcion]

Wow.

[Bill Simmons]

I mean, that's earlier Crying Game.

[Sean Fennessey]

I see a different kind of twist, but it was another one where it's like, don't spoil a Crying Game.

[Bill Simmons]

That's true.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, that's true.

[Bill Simmons]

That was a part of the marketing campaign, for sure. I think that the difference was that these movies were a little bit pulpier, a little bit less prestigious in a way. The Crying Game was presented as such an Oscar film. Neil Jordan movie.

[Jason Concepcion]

This is a genre movie, right?

[Bill Simmons]

Exactly. I remember, obviously, I was furious about the reveal when I learned it while watching the Daily show, but in general, I'm really nostalgic for this period of movie going. And now it's like, did Thanos snap everybody out of existence? Is the big twist. And, you know, we don't want to spoil that either. And there is this kind of false sanctity around talking about what happened. And, you know, I was in the middle of negotiating an interview with a director recently, and it's a filmmaker I really like, and I'm looking forward to talking to this person. But they were like, the director would like to come on on this date so that he can talk about spoilers from the film. So that completely alters the nature of the conversation.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure.

[Bill Simmons]

I wonder what it was like for somebody like M. Night to kind of be arranging and strategizing his career around these kinds of, you know, personal and creative choices, you know?

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, it's. You have to. Going back to 1999, you're talking about early Internet. I think I might have had email for, like, a year. At that point, there was just much less of a chance that you would actually get. You had to get spoiled by basic Cape Town.

[Bill Simmons]

And even then, it felt like a sin.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah. So unlike today, where it's like you can just turn on your phone and get spoiled by any old thing. Trying to engage with your work email, trying to look at Twitter, look at Instagram, for any old reason, you get spoiled. Back then, it felt like it was much easier to get a plot twist like this through. Thinking about what you said about a magic trick. The casting of Bruce Willis, I think, was really so important for that, because you just are primed to think, this guy's gonna. This guy won't die in the first 35 seconds of the movie.

[Bill Simmons]

He's our hero.

[Jason Concepcion]

He's our hero. He's gonna be there the whole way. And of course he is in the movie the whole time. But that subtle psychological bias that you have is so important for making this whole thing work. Cause as Ebert says, when you watch it again, watching again this morning, it is all right there. It's all right there in front of you. Like when he's. When. When Cole says, I see dead people finally tells the secret to his psychologist, the camera very subtly pans in on Bruce and that should be a tell, but you just don't feel it.

[Bill Simmons]

Famously, Frank Marshall, the producer of this movie, wanted to cut that cut to Bruce Willis because he thought that that was a dead giveaway of what the story was. And it's interesting that they decided to keep that. And frankly, most people just didn't catch on to that. Now I will say, while this isn't really one of my favorite movies of all time, I feel like it's one of the first movies to redefine the notion of rewatchable.

[Sean Fennessey]

I was just gonna bring this up, so go ahead. Well, there's this whole thing of like, especially before streaming services, when albums would hit a certain level of like platinum status or you know, when Hooty and the Blowfish is like just absolutely ubiquitous, it's not just cause everybody is buying it, it's because they're also buying copies for friends. You go into a certain level of evangelism, but also like shareability and also people who are like, I want to recreate this experience for other people. I think the similar thing happens to certain blockbuster movies like the Matrix and like Sixth Sense where people are going back to rewatch it. Because there was not YouTube Easter egg videos, there were not explainer videos. You had to go back and be like, I'll pay $7 again and I'll go to a matinee on Saturday because I want to see if he ever notices. Or is Haley Joel's character aware that he's dead the whole time? Or is it, you know, all these things that are questions that you would immediately on a Friday night. Now if you saw Sixth Sense, you'd go home and the three of us here make this content where we're like, here's what you need to know about this movie.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yep.

[Sean Fennessey]

We like, single handedly, we are part of the industry that keeps people from being like, I guess I gotta see that movie.

[Bill Simmons]

Right?

[Sean Fennessey]

And it's such a different time now. The rewatchability of this movie as a case that you go Back to over and over to try and solve. You can't overstate how important that was.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, yeah. Let's lift the curtain a little bit. When we're doing a podcast like this, obviously we prepare, we rewatch the movie. Particularly if you're in the seat that I'm in right now, which is hosting, and you have all the categories in front of you. You have to take notes while you're doing it. And I was doing the typical strategy for recording a show like this for this movie, and inevitably, I'm looking at my computer a lot and not watching the screen. And you can't do it that way. I got an hour into the movie, and I was like, I have to start over again. I have to watch the movie and not take any notes. Because what's interesting about the movie are the tells, the things where M. Night is kind of indicating, oh, watch the check get pulled away at the restaurant quickly. Watch the expression on a person's face. Watch the lack of interaction between two characters to indicate that one of them is a ghost. It's not rocket science, but there is a lot of care put into preserving and maintaining this story in a smart way. And I do think that that's a new way of rewatching.

[Sean Fennessey]

There's also, like, I forgot that I can't remember. You tell me if, when you saw in the theater in 99, there's a feint that Cole is evil or could be vulnerable to that kind of thing. Because when she goes into the kitchen in the beginning and he's opened all the drawers, or she thinks he's opened all the doors to look for Pop Tarts, and he's like, I'm looking for Pop Tarts. And the whole Stanley the Stutterer thing, the whole thing with the teacher, that's.

[Jason Concepcion]

The part that's a great story.

[Sean Fennessey]

And it's like, what's up with this kid? And if you go back and watch it, you're like, man, they don't make him this innocent. Like this innocent, clear hero character who's being besieged by ghosts. You're like, something's up. I just don't know what it is yet.

[Jason Concepcion]

That's a great point, because you don't actually see the ghosts until well into the movie. What you get is the fact that he's doing these kind of free associated writings that seem very dark and violent. The scene you're talking about, that really wonderful shot of all the drawers open in the kitchen, where it's like the camera follows Lynn into another room. She comes back and the drawers are just open. And that's a. I remember, amazingly staged.

[Bill Simmons]

There's a couple of these that are so incredibly staged.

[Jason Concepcion]

It's a really effective jump scare. You get the thing where he's locked into the crawl space and he's freaking out. And I remember at the time thinking, oh, is it like he's like a troubled kid who has some kind of telekinetic powers maybe and is doing this stuff you just didn't know?

[Bill Simmons]

So let me read actually a synopsis of the movie because I think that that indicates some of the feints that we're talking about here. So in this description of the movie, it says, Malcolm Crowe is a child psychologist who receives an award on the same night that he is visited by a very unhappy ex patient. After this encounter, Qrow takes on the task of curing a young boy with the same ills as the ex patient. This boy sees dead people. Qrow spends a lot of time with the boy, much to the dismay of his wife. Cole's mom is at her wit's end with what to do about her son's increasing problems. Qrow is the boy's only hope. This description makes it seem like the person with the problem in the movie is the boy and the person with the problem in the movie is the dead guy. And that's such a genius construction. There's something so amazing when you get to the end of the movie. It's the catharsis is with Bruce Willis. It's not with this boy.

[Sean Fennessey]

To think about getting everybody from every level of a studio on board with, we are going to lie to people. Not J.J. abrams is gonna go out there and say Benedict Cumberbatch is not con lied people, which didn't work anyway. But we are going to misdirect everyone about what this movie is literally about. And that's. That takes from Disney, from a company that spends 18 months before a movie comes out being like, don't worry, it's gonna be okay. There's gonna be Star wars stuff in these new Star wars movies. And telling you and repeating that and seeding it for such a long time to be like, let's see if we can fuck with people a little bit. What a different time needed to be.

[Bill Simmons]

A word of mouth phenomenon. And it truly was. It was a movie that people like you saw in Theater Station. You were like, holy shit, this blew my mind.

[Jason Concepcion]

Blown away.

[Bill Simmons]

Should we go to the categories?

[Jason Concepcion]

Sure, let's go.

[Chris Ryan]

Today is the most rewatchable scene is brought to you by Paramount Plus A mountain of movies awaits on Paramount. Plus that means a mountain of heart pounding action with blockbusters like Top Gun, Maverick, Mission Impossible, Fallout and Gladiator. Three movies we've done on the rewatchables. A mountain of jump scares with thrillers like Scream 6, Smile and A Quiet Place, day one that's also on Paramount. A mountain of fun for the kiddos with family favorites like Paw Patrol, the Movie and Dora and the Lost City of Gold, also on Paramount. Discover something new every week on Paramount. And now here's the most rewatchable scenes.

[Bill Simmons]

I've got a few nominees here. I find this to be in keeping with what we were discussing, sort of looking at clues and also looking at what we're. The most effectively staged scares I feel like is the best way to approach this. But if you have other things, feel free to nominate them. The opening shooting of Malcolm Crowe and the sequence with Vincent Grey and Donnie Wahlberg. I don't want to be afraid.

[Sean Fennessey]

Don't worry.

[Bill Simmons]

Just give me a minute. I waited 10 years for you.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm not giving you nothing.

[Bill Simmons]

Ben Freaking. Some people, they call me freak. Ronald Sumner.

[Sean Fennessey]

I am, I am a freak looking Vince.

[Bill Simmons]

You know, I think also one of the most shocking aspects of this movie is realizing that that's Donnie Wahlberg.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, I didn't know also just like.

[Sean Fennessey]

I did not know him being like, it's important for me to lose £40 for this role.

[Bill Simmons]

For 90 seconds on screen. Shaving his eyebrows.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, he's like Christian Bale. Get on my level for the mechanic. When you do the mechanic in eight years or whatever it is. Get on my level. Dud.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a really. That's how you know you're in an upsetting movie because the tension that comes with what Gray is saying to him and revealing is really well staged. Dinner with Anna Crowe on their anniversary. Very short sequence, but very, very, very interesting. The way that it's shot, the way that Olivia Williams literally never raises her head to make eye contact with him.

[Jason Concepcion]

Never.

[Bill Simmons]

Malcolm and Lynne Cyr wait for Cole to come home. So this is right before the sequence where Malcolm has the conversation with Cole where he kind of takes steps forward and steps back as he asks him questions. But just watching the two of those characters sit in those chairs facing each other, not making eye contact, not speaking to one another and not thinking that that was weird. There's a lot of things when you rewatch the movie and you think, huh, it's really strange how Malcolm Crowe doesn't talk to anybody. He doesn't have interaction with any character except for Cole. The ic dead people revelation, the locked in the attic sequence or the crawl space. I just wrote down Lenny, you're a terrible husband. That ghost moment, the woman revealing suicide.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's a great Kubrickian kind of shining moment.

[Bill Simmons]

Exactly. The hanged trio in the school, which kind of pays off. The stuttering Stanley explication. Kira, her first appearance when Misha Barton hits the screen vomiting from her mouth because her mother has been making her sick. This movie felt very ahead of its time in terms of Munchausen by Proxy syndrome. It's amazing to look back on that. I had no idea what that was when I first saw this film. And then the car sequence at the end in which, during the accident, Cole explains his connection to the dead and his mother's revelation of what's really wrong with him. Any other candidates?

[Sean Fennessey]

I mentioned the drawers and the Pop Tarts moment and just the reveal of. Is there something. Does this kid have telekinetic powers? Is this kid evil? I thought that was a great, unnerving moment, but for me, it's by far the car accident sequence at the end.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, that's the same thing for me.

[Bill Simmons]

Me too. Grandma's gone.

[Jason Concepcion]

You know that.

[Bill Simmons]

I know.

[Jason Concepcion]

She wanted me to tell you.

[Sean Fennessey]

She wanted me to tell you she saw you dance. She said when you were little, you.

[Jason Concepcion]

And her had a fight right before your dance recital. You thought she didn't come to see you dance.

[Bill Simmons]

She did. Rewatching it again.

[Sean Fennessey]

This is the most human part. I think it's worth mentioning that. I don't know when you want to talk about what happened to Shyamalan after this and what his movies are like after this, but I think you got.

[Bill Simmons]

A little category called what's aged the worst.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure. Well, then I'll save my bit for then.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Chris Ryan]

Today's the most rewatchable scene was brought to you by Paramount Plus. From action blockbusters to thrillers to favorites for the whole family, find something new to watch every week. A mountain of movies awaits on Paramount Plus. Plans start at 7.99amonth. Start streaming now.

[Jason Concepcion]

Just as a. As a runner up, it's not even a Probably a top five scene in this movie, but there's that little scene of Lynn and Cole coming out of the supermarket where he's in the shopping cart and she pushes him and he puts his arms out and it's wonderful and absolutely nails down the emotion and chemistry and the love that they have for each other. It just, like, sells it and it makes those Reveals that come later in the film just hit like a hammer.

[Bill Simmons]

I love that you said that. When I was watching that sequence last night, I was like, it's insane that this is not a gif that we see all the time in our timeline. Because the look on Haley Joel Osman's face is. It's pure elation. You know, it's great acting. He's such a great actor. And we'll talk about that in this next category, which is called what's Aged the Best? I wrote down the tone and pacing of the movie, which unfurls slowly and patiently. And to be this patient in a summer blockbuster is powerful and rare. And we really just don't see it from the movies that we come to expect as event movies now and again. Even though this is not a movie that I would say that I love, I'm still impressed by it. It's still shocking how somebody as unseasoned as M. Night Shyamalan brought all of this skill into what is effectively his first movie. It's not, you know, I think Wide Awake was the name of his first film, but so I noted that we already talked about the aha. Endings of movies in the late 90s. I feel like those movies, for the most part, hold up really well. And in fact, I miss them. I wish that we had more of them. And Haley Joel Osment, greatest child performer ever.

[Jason Concepcion]

He's.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, up there against, like, Anna Paquin and the Piano. My gosh, I can't even. I mean, like, we could get into, like, Judy Garland stuff, but, like.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I mean, I think it's in the conversation. The Shirley Temples of the world and all those figures, you know, all the kids in the Charlie Chaplin movies. Like, he's just Peter Billingsley, right? Yeah, Peter Billingsley. Yeah. Christmas Story, one of the icons.

[Jason Concepcion]

He just crushes it and gives you a range of emotions, like sadness, the elation. Talked about real anger, fear. That scene you were talking about where Haley comes home and Lynn and Malcolm are already there and he's gotta walk into the room and see Malcolm and there's gotta be something, like, when you watch it again, fear on his face because he's terrified. He's seeing this ghost in his living room. But you've got to read that also as trepidation of, like, here we go again. Another psychiatrist in my life. This person I have to talk to. And if you don't get that performance, it's over and he gives it to you.

[Bill Simmons]

Haley Joel was not completely unseasoned when he made this movie. He appeared five years earlier in Forrest Gump in a very memorable performance as Little Forest. Yeah, he was in a handful of movies. He was also in this movie Bogus, that came out three years before this. I think he was 11 at the time of this movie. And the character he's playing is nine years old. And he's just got an eerie command.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. I mean, I think whenever you have very adult mannerisms and very adult emotional spectrum within a kid that young, it's just always gonna be gripping to watch. There's something really strangely, like, for as much as I think we always respond to movies like the Goonies, where, like, kids are like, hey, ride at this BMX with me. It's like, there's very magnetic about seeing adult intellect in someone so small and.

[Bill Simmons]

So young, but not weirdly. Not like, achingly precocious. You know, he's not like Abigail Breslin, where someone's using a lot of big words and they seem kind of smarter than everybody in the room.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

There's like a. There's something emotional about what he's communicating.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think it's. Cause I think his character is very finely drawn in the sense that, like, this is a kid who spends a lot of time by himself, a lot of time reading, a lot of time playing by himself, a lot of time, like, just looking at stuff. Like all the stuff he says about Vietnam when he's like, do you want to play with my 6th Battalion, 4th Marine Corps in the Nha Trang province? How did he actually even know all that? But it is something that kids get weird and start reading stuff and then memorize it.

[Jason Concepcion]

One of the things about child actors is when they put in a notable performance, it's always the question, at least in my mind, is always, okay, are they good, or is this character just so in line with their actual personality that they just nailed it? And it was just clear that this. There was too much stuff like that that was weird, but also part and parcel of what it is to be a kid. All these, like, disparate influences that you would just remember and then spit out, that it was just clear that this was a unique acting performance.

[Sean Fennessey]

There's also, like, kids are strange. Like, there was definitely a point in my life where I could not really multiply, but did know a lot about King Arthur. You know what I mean? Like, you just get focused, like, oh, it's like, I could tell you exactly what happened during Custer's Last Stand, but I can't divide anything.

[Bill Simmons]

And how is that true from right now?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't know.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, so any other. What's aged the best? I mean, you mentioned Toni Collette also as just a really powerful performer, Oscar nominated. This is her only Oscar nomination, which I was surprised to hear. There was a big campaign for her last year when Hereditary came out, which is in keeping with the tortured mother surrounded by ghosts theme of her career. She's just an amazing actress. I tend to forget she's Australian.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes, I would say that. I mean, just to reiterate what I said during our intro is just the idea of Philadelphia as this both living and dead piece of history and the idea that everywhere you walk, this is true. Everywhere you walk in Philadelphia, there's some little plaque that's like, in 1779, this happened here. And you're like, oh, this is a. A bodega. But it's also where they sign this piece of paper, so they do a really good job of evoking that sense of living history in Philadelphia.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, so this is a. I'm gonna spoil. What's age? The worst question, but Toni Collette, Philadelphian. You buy that?

[Jason Concepcion]

No, it's like, just kind of like a ambiguous eastern seaboard, mostly New York.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a little closer to Brooklyn that she's doing and not so much Philadelphia.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. I don't necessarily buy it, but I also think that everybody in M. Night Shyamalan movies are kind of a little bit off, so it works. Oh, yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

What a nice save. I should have been a producer on this movie. Any other what stage the best.

[Jason Concepcion]

You know, the performance by Haley Jewel, I think is still. It stands the test of time. It's incredible.

[Sean Fennessey]

I just want to give every award to Tommy Thomasimo. So Tommy Tommasino is.

[Bill Simmons]

We're going to get to him. Don't worry.

[Jason Concepcion]

Love, my guy. Tommy Tommasino.

[Bill Simmons]

What's aged the worst? I wrote down M. Night Shyamalan's twist ending factory.

[Sean Fennessey]

Mm.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

You want to vamp, you want to do your thing.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, my thing is just that he somehow found a story that was appropriate for the way he writes dialogue, which is super weird and stilted. And the way I would imagine, given seeing all of his movies, he directs actors, which is super weird and stilted. And when Zooey Deschanel is delivering that dialogue, it becomes borderline, like the Room. And when Haylie Joel Osment is doing it, you're just like, I'm creeped out. This is really effective and atmospheric. I think that there are highs and lows. I don't know that I ever actually Saw lady in the Water.

[Bill Simmons]

It's quite bad. It also makes the cardinal sin of creating a character that is a film critic and is eaten by a monster.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right.

[Jason Concepcion]

Oh, good.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh, and you can imagine what he was trying to say there. Never said that.

[Jason Concepcion]

Is that a metaphor?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, I kind of like signs.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. So let me go back and just give a little bit of M. Night history. I said this was his second film. It's actually his third film. He made a movie in 1992 called Praying with Anger that he wrote and directed. And then in 1998. Now in 1992, M Night was 22 years old. He made his first film when he was 22. When this movie came out, he was 28 years old. It's very, very hard to get films made in Hollywood. It's very, very hard to have three films done in Hollywood by the time you're 28 years old. He also did an uncredited rewrite on the script for she's all that in 1999. And he also has a screenwriting credit on the film, Stuart Little. So, wow. The God of 99 is M. Night Shyamalan. I'll read down his films really quickly, and then, Jason, you can explain kind of what's your hierarchy of Shyamalan work?

[Jason Concepcion]

Sure.

[Bill Simmons]

So immediately after this, he makes Unbreakable, which was an extraordinarily prescient and interesting movie. Imperfect, but very interesting. Signs, The Village, lady in the Water, the Happening, the Last Airbender, After Earth, the Visit, and then this quote unquote comeback with Split in Glass. What's your take on the shape of his career now that we've got 20 years of it?

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, I remember being absolutely confused as to how he could still be free from movie jail after lady in the Water. Out there making movies like the Happening, I think I loved, obviously loved Sixth Sense. I thought Unbreakable was great. I really enjoyed it. The Village I liked until I realized what was happening. And then I was like, come on, this is the Twilight.

[Bill Simmons]

This is like a Twilight Zone episode 12.

[Jason Concepcion]

This is a Twilight Zone episode, and it's 45 minutes too long to be that. And then it just kind of went downhill, you know, like, the Last Airbender is not his ip, so you can't really blame him for that. But I was, like, almost offended by that movie. And then his kind of like, I'm going to create my M. Night Shyamalan interior universe and kind of like, stealth sell it back to you. Like, Rejuvenation is actually one of the most amazing comebacks in Film history.

[Bill Simmons]

It's a crazy flex.

[Jason Concepcion]

And to go back to what has aged the worst, it's his early flex of putting himself in the Sixth Sense as the Doctor. But, I mean, it just shows you the confidence he has in himself to then come back and be like, actually, all that early stuff, let's go back, let's do sequels of those. And you're not even gonna know that there are sequels of them when you go see the movie. It's really interesting the fact that he never went to Movie Jail 1 and 2 seemed to come to a comfort level with his own process. It seemed like there was a moment there where he was like. Where even he was like, okay, I guess I just do twist ending thrillers. Is that really what I do? And then at a certain point, certainly by split, he's like, yes, that's what I do. That's what I do. And here it is. I am the Hitchcock of this, of whatever. This is so really a unique and weird career.

[Bill Simmons]

I give him a lot of credit for having the foresight to know that it's important to have a brand, which is kind of a shitty thing, but also something that most great filmmakers were very conscientious about. John Ford was very aware of this. Alfred Hitchcock was very aware of this. Quentin Tarantino has always been very aware of this. It almost doesn't matter if your movies are good or bad. But to say an M. Night Shyamalan film for that to mean something to audiences is powerful. Obviously, Steven Spielberg and George Lucas and that whole generation of filmmakers did the same thing. I give him a lot of credit for that, and I give him a lot of credit for just having a lot of gall.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

He definitely follows through on all of his ideas, even when half of them aren't good.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think also it's worth noting that the Comeback really happened with the Visitor and that it kind of needed something like Blumhouse to be out there, to be sort of like, just make the movie you want to make with this limited amount of budget. And we think the margins are going to be right here.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

And it was the perfect size canvas for his ideas. I think it's crucial that sixth sense is 90 minutes. I don't think this guy is an intergalactic epic storyteller. It's the big difference between all the people who get kind of touched with the you're the next Spielberg magic and can't quite fulfill it. Whether it's Colin Trevorrow or M. Night or whoever. There really is only one Spielberg because there's only one guy who understands how to tell intimate human stories on such a huge, huge screen. But there are a lot of people who can do different things that feel Spielberg y, right? And he's one of them. He can tell us this really amazing story that really can. You can suspend disbelief while you're there. When you're watching the Visit, when you're watching Glass, when you're watching Sixth Sense, when you're watching Signs, for me, you're like, oh, wow, this makes a lot of sense. And I'll tell you what, even the beginning of the happening, before people start really acting, you're like, this is kind of cool.

[Bill Simmons]

The setup is good.

[Jason Concepcion]

The setup is good.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's just as soon as people have to start actually interacting with one another and you realize like, oh, this is what this whole movie is gonna be, is them being like, did you hear the trees? The trees? I heard them.

[Bill Simmons]

I've always wanted to be a fly on the wall. In hearing an M. Night pitch in the room, I've always wanted to be there. When he explains the concept of one of his movies, this movie in particular, you can imagine being a studio executive. And even though it'd be hard to figure out specifically how you're gonna promote a movie like the Sixth Sense, to hear someone explain the story to you for the first time, similarly to watching it for the first time, you'd just be like, oh, my God, we got somebody who has incredible invention inside of them. Inevitably, you get to the Happening pitch meeting and they explain that it's the trees, and you're like, I got a lot of regrets about throwing a lot of money at M. Night Shyamalan. Nevertheless, I do think that it's interesting how his approach and his Persona has aged badly, but his career is back on track. Yeah, you know, I think Glass may be slightly underperformed, but for the most part, M. Night Shyamalan is now maybe the most successful director of original movies that is alive right now and self.

[Jason Concepcion]

Financed the last few of them. Right.

[Bill Simmons]

I think in conjunction with Blumhouse. I think he took on a lot of risk in order to make these movies.

[Sean Fennessey]

Has largely lived outside of the Hollywood ecosystem. Lives out in suburban Philadelphia in some huge spread. Shoots his movies, I think, in Philly, for the most part.

[Jason Concepcion]

Courtside at the Sixers.

[Bill Simmons]

Too busy studying JJ's jumper.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, but it's a completely different world than being out in Malibu and just putting together these after Earth type debacles.

[Bill Simmons]

Let's talk about some more. What's aged? The worst stuff I just, I wrote down Bruce Willis, child psychologist. I'm not sure he's terribly convincing. I think there's probably some complicated notions of mental health in this movie that like if you really wanted to get into the nitty gritty. Sure. Not the gentlest examination of what happens to young kids. Also, the mayor of Philadelphia gave a child psychologist an award.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure.

[Jason Concepcion]

And then later when we hear his.

[Sean Fennessey]

Tapes, there's not a ton going on in Philly.

[Bill Simmons]

And then later, what are you doing?

[Jason Concepcion]

When we hear Malcolm's tapes of him in therapy with Vincent, he's literally just like standing up and doing other stuff as his patient is breaking down crying.

[Bill Simmons]

My follow up note was one who clearly mistreated a young boy who grew up to be a murderer. Not what you want if you're the mayor of Philly.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Any other what stage the worst.

[Sean Fennessey]

Now you're really making me rethink Philly mayors. There's actually a pretty checkered history of Philly mayors. So I do think though that like we expect mayors to just always be doing big time boss shit. But there's a lot of like. I'd like to present this to the greatest banana vendor the Reading terminal has ever seen. Johnny Banana. You know, like it's just there's a lot of small town bullshit that goes along with it.

[Bill Simmons]

I think M Night probably has to win this category just. Just because of the endless amount of content he's provided us over the years. Want to shop Walmart?

[Chris Ryan]

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[Bill Simmons]

Get early access to our hottest deals. Join now and get 50% off a.

[Chris Ryan]

One year annual membership.

[Jason Concepcion]

Shop Black Friday deals first with Walmart.

[Bill Simmons]

Walmart plus see [e-mail].

[Jason Concepcion]

This episode is.

[Bill Simmons]

Brought to you by SkinnyPop.

[Jason Concepcion]

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[Bill Simmons]

Endlessly delicious. Oh so light and crunchy.

[Jason Concepcion]

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[Sean Fennessey]

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[Bill Simmons]

Perfectly popped, endlessly delicious.

[Sean Fennessey]

Give yourself permission to snack and pick.

[Bill Simmons]

Up Skinny Pop original popcorn. Today. The 1999 award for the most 1999 thing. A couple of candidates. VHS tapes. Just a lot of VHS tapes in here. Landlines. There's a lot of landlines here.

[Jason Concepcion]

Love a landline.

[Bill Simmons]

I just thought the decor of kind of dingy eastern seaboard homes in this time, a lot of the glassware and the tabletops.

[Sean Fennessey]

Transitioning out of the 70s into an IKEA dominated world, but not quite there yet.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I feel like just homes look different Now, Yeah. And there's something. This felt more like a period piece. Rewatching it, it's interesting how that changes, because in its time, it seemed like a fairly authentic representation of what it was like to live in a Philly row house.

[Sean Fennessey]

I mean, it does. And it was also before, I think a lot of. There was, like, a lot of gentrification and regeneration happening downtown. So somebody like Toni Collette's character could definitely afford an apartment wherever I think it's on. I think it's, like, in and around Locust street or something like that.

[Bill Simmons]

So. Okay, what is. Is that like a nice neighborhood?

[Sean Fennessey]

It is, yeah. Yeah. Now it is. I mean, it's always been, like, fine, but, like, it's.

[Bill Simmons]

It's.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's a little bit more Tony now.

[Bill Simmons]

She's hustling two jobs to make it work.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, she is. And you know how important those two jobs are.

[Bill Simmons]

Any other candidates for the 1999 award?

[Jason Concepcion]

Just the complete lack of cellular technology. Gadgetry of any kind, you know?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. I wonder.

[Sean Fennessey]

Just nobody Googles. He doesn't Google Dr. Malcolm Crowe.

[Bill Simmons]

But I do think that actually a remake of this movie would be easier because cellular technology and phones have decreased the amount of human interaction we have. So the idea of Malcolm Crowe not talking to anybody would be more believable now. There's just so many people that are just spend all their time looking at.

[Sean Fennessey]

Devices in this movie.

[Bill Simmons]

I don't think so.

[Sean Fennessey]

No. No.

[Bill Simmons]

Also, was he. Well, we'll get to nitpicks in a bit. I have some nitpicks here. Chris, any other candidates for this category?

[Sean Fennessey]

What's Age of the Worst? No, I think the M. Night thing you got there is right.

[Bill Simmons]

What about 1999?

[Sean Fennessey]

Oh, 1999. I think the clothes are good. They don't seem too dated. I always really am sort of fascinated by Willis wardrobe because it's just like that rumpled raincoat.

[Bill Simmons]

He looks like Philip Marlowe.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. And it is a classic kind of rumpled detective look. But at the same time, you can kind of buy him. He's wearing all brown all the time. I know color is a very important part of this movie. The red. The use of red is a huge thing. But, yeah, I've always really liked the wardrobe and the set design like you were talking about.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, let's go to the next category. Casting. What ifs? I could only find one. Marisa Tomei was considered for the role of Lynne Cyr. Well, what do we think about Marisa Tomei instead of Toni Collette?

[Sean Fennessey]

So Would that have been post cousin?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, post My Cousin Vinny.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think it would have probably been more authentically Philadelphian.

[Bill Simmons]

Oh.

[Sean Fennessey]

But I don't know if you get that moment in the car.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, I don't think you get it.

[Sean Fennessey]

With no disrespect to Marisa Tomei, of whom I am a huge fan.

[Jason Concepcion]

Same.

[Bill Simmons]

Marisa Tomei did not work in the year 1999. Did not make a film prior to that. She had made Slums of Beverly Hills and Welcome to Sarajevo.

[Sean Fennessey]

Wow.

[Bill Simmons]

Kind of a weird time for her career.

[Jason Concepcion]

What a. What a mood swing that is.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. From Oscar nominated to welcome to Sarajevo, Next category.

[Jason Concepcion]

Saw that in the theater.

[Bill Simmons]

Did you know?

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, I did.

[Bill Simmons]

Was your mind as blown as it was when you saw the Sixth Sense?

[Jason Concepcion]

I was like, man, I am bummed out.

[Bill Simmons]

The Dion Waiters award for biggest heat check. Donnie Wahlberg.

[Jason Concepcion]

Oh, yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Misha Barton. M. Night Shyamalan as Dr. Hill.

[Sean Fennessey]

That is a heat check of casting. Yes. To cast yourself.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Who do we think as a performer is really heating up.

[Sean Fennessey]

You're not putting Trevor Morgan in here. Well, Tommy T. Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Crushing it.

[Bill Simmons]

I put him in the Saul Ruben Ek Award. Okay, okay, so we'll get there.

[Sean Fennessey]

Harsh but fair.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay. You want Tommy T In the list?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, I think one shot losing from 40 pounds for about 90 seconds of screen time is as Dion Waiters y. As you could get 43. 43 pounds.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah. I just love, like, I need to know the process if I'm him.

[Sean Fennessey]

And that's the end result of everything I did for this movie. And while you can always be like I was in Sixth Sense, you know, I was Vincent, you know, thank you. Thank you for your plot. It's. I just don't. You're never gonna get me to do anything for another acting role ever again. I'm just gonna show up on Blue Bloods wearing exactly what I wore that day. I'm eating whataburger every day. What's his. Wahlburgers. I'm eating Wahlburgers every day. I'm not losing a pound. I'm not gaining a pound. I'm not changing my hair. I'm not shaving my eyebrows.

[Bill Simmons]

Can I read you the names of the movies that Donnie Wahlberg had appeared in before this movie?

[Jason Concepcion]

Please?

[Bill Simmons]

This is real. 1996, Bullet.

[Jason Concepcion]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

1996, Ransom.

[Jason Concepcion]

Good movie.

[Bill Simmons]

1996, Black Circle Boys.

[Jason Concepcion]

Never saw it.

[Bill Simmons]

1998, Body Count. 1998, Butter and the Denouement in 1998, Southie. That's his film work to this Moment. He's pretty good in Ransom, but he's like the eighth henchman. Yeah, Very unlikely, very strange. Donny, the eldest member of the New Kids on the Block, transitioning to his acting performance well after his brother rose to significant fame.

[Jason Concepcion]

Now, if I recall correctly, the reason he did this was because he wanted to be taken seriously as a serious actor. Yes. And so then I'm on his IMDb now. And his roles after this were the Practice, TV series, Diamond Men.

[Bill Simmons]

Never heard of it.

[Jason Concepcion]

Bull Fighter.

[Bill Simmons]

Yep.

[Jason Concepcion]

Big Apple, the TV series Band of Brothers. Excellent.

[Sean Fennessey]

He's good in Band of Brothers.

[Jason Concepcion]

He's excellent in that and then a bunch of other stuff. It is unclear to me whether he could have gotten these.

[Sean Fennessey]

Do you think Band of Brothers is the most, like, the most, most highly approved piece of culture from people our age to our fathers ages?

[Bill Simmons]

That's a great question.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, does anything have a higher approval rating across the board by guys age like 35 to 75? The prized demo?

[Bill Simmons]

Sure, yeah, I buy that. I want to shout out Boomtown too, which was a really good TV show that Donnie Wahlberg was the star of, created by Graham Yost, who would go on to create Justified. I feel like we have to give this award to Donnie Wahlberg.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, definitely.

[Bill Simmons]

Half assed Internet research. Boy, I've got a lot. How much of it should I read?

[Sean Fennessey]

Well, you gotta tell the story about the producer, about the guy at Disney.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay. David Vogel, then president of production of the Walt Disney Studios, read Shyamalan's spec script and instantly loved it. Without obtaining corporate approval, Vogel bought the rights to the script despite the high price of $3 million and the stipulation that Shyamalan could direct the film. Disney later dismissed Vogel from his position at the studio, with Vogel leaving the company shortly thereafter, Disney, apparently, in a show of little confidence in the film, sold the production rights to Spyglass Entertainment while retaining the distribution rights and 12.5% of the film's box office receipt.

[Sean Fennessey]

So I have a ton of questions. Yeah, how does one get to pull the trigger on a $3 million check?

[Jason Concepcion]

You could just go off the rez.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like that, but you could get fired for it. Do you know what I mean? Like, you're either. To me, it seems like it's something that you can either be like, I can get these funds because that's the position I hold. But somebody comes back from vacation and it's like, Vogel, what have you been up to? And he's like, ah, I cut this guy M Night a check for 3 million. Starring Bruce Willis and a kid that no one's ever heard of about ghosts. And they're like, you're fired. What's the story there? I gotta know. Like, does he just have a checking account number that he can. Is he put it on his corporate card.

[Jason Concepcion]

It has to have something to do with the fact that he, if I recall correctly, agreed to let M Night direct also which Wild flex by my guy, M. Night. Respect it. But it has to have something to do with that. Right? That was seen as going off the rez.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, you can say a lot of stuff to people. You can be like, we're gonna do this, you and me. They're gonna see us next year at the Oscars. It's gonna be nothing but stacking checks and putting projects in development. But at a certain point, you have to take it to the guy above you and be like, so, what's up?

[Jason Concepcion]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

Every company is different. The president of production has a lot of power at certain studios. Especially back then when Buena Vista was making far more films and could more aggressively green light films and there was more competition for hot scripts. So it's possible to me that David Vogel made a big promise to an agent and that agent held his feet to the fire. And Disney knowing. Let's say that agent, for the sake of conversation, this is not a fact at all, but let's say that agent was Michael Ovitz. If it were Michael Ovitz and you gave him a verbal agreement over the phone and you were the president of production at Disney, Michael Ovitz would fucking hold you to that word.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right?

[Bill Simmons]

And it's possible that David Bogle got himself into one of these situations. I don't know. There was a story in 2015 in the desert Sun. Here's the title of that story. Mogul to mentor. To understand digicom and its metamorphosis, you first have to understand David Vogel.

[Jason Concepcion]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

This is the man who was dismissed from Disney and is now clearly the subject of a profile in the Desert Sun. Fascinating piece of filmmaking, production, arcana. I guess there we'll probably never truly know what happened. I'd like to know who dismissed him.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Reportedly, Haley Joel Osment got the role of Coal Sear for one of three reasons. One, director M. Night Shyamalan, was surprised when he asked Haley Joel Osment if you read the part. Osment replied, I read it three times last night. Shyamalan was impressed, saying, wow, you read your part three times? To which Osmond replied, no, I read this script three times.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's like Elizabeth Warren, reading the Mueller report in one night. Just being like, I read it.

[Jason Concepcion]

Where you at?

[Bill Simmons]

It's very similar to that.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

This movie was rented by 80 million people in 2000, making it the year's top rated VHS and DVD title.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Sleeper hit in Entertainment Weekly's 134 film summer movie preview of 1999. The Sixth Sense was not even mentioned in M. Night Shyamalan's early drafts of the script. The Bruce Willis character was a crime scene photographer and not a child psychologist, which I think perhaps explains his wardrobe.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

This was the first of two movies that Bruce Willis owed Disney after he caused another production, the Broadway Brawler, to be shut down due to him firing the director. He was also paid $10 million, which is half of his usual salary at the time. Bruce Willis, tough times. It's difficult to talk about him. I'm not sure if there's a big time movie star with a worse reputation. He is a person who repeatedly. If people who have worked with him are interviewed about their experience, they do not have nice things to say about it.

[Sean Fennessey]

I would highly, highly recommend that you guys check out this video of Kevin Smith telling a very, very, very long story about doing rewrite work and appearing in Live Free or Die Harder. And Bruce Willis attitudes about Timothy Oliphant.

[Jason Concepcion]

Oh, good.

[Sean Fennessey]

And the way in which the John McClane character should be portrayed. And also I think Fox's attitudes about how much goddamn money it was costing to make what was going to be a not great diehard movie. And it is high key, amazing to listen to this story so you can find it on YouTube. It's really, really funny.

[Jason Concepcion]

I will look that up. I was recently reading an Oliphant interview where he was talking about why he made those movies. And he was like, I bought a house. I bought a house. And I was like, oh, what's that? Die hard in Russia. Yeah. Good. Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

Pays the bills.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

When Cole and his mother are sitting in the kitchen, there is a glass on the table that can only be bought in Philadelphia. It originally comes filled with pen made sour cream which is not readily available anywhere else.

[Sean Fennessey]

I feel like that's fake news.

[Bill Simmons]

Did that jump out to you at all?

[Sean Fennessey]

That's fake news. I've never heard of that before. That seems like something someone from Long island would say about Philadelphia. And I think it's suspicious that you're saying that.

[Bill Simmons]

Well, this is half assed Internet research. Not fully asked Internet research. So we'll never know. This is an important filmmaking aspect of this. The color red is intentionally absent from most of the film, but it is used prominently in a few isolated shots for anything in the real world that has been tainted by the other world and to connote really explosively emotional moments and situations. Examples include the door of the church where Cole seeks sanctuary, the balloon, the carpet and Cole's sweater at the birthday party. The tent in which he first encounters Kira, the volume numbers on Qrow's tape recorder, the doorknob on the locked basement door where Malcolm's office is located, the shirt that Anna wears at the restaurant, Kira's mother's dress at the wake, and the shawl wrapped around the sleeping Anna. I don't know if there's much to explore here other than it's kind of like film class 101. Like, use a color in a smart way. But it is well done, and it's nice to have these things. It's nice that there are choices that are being made and that we can understand what those choices mean and that they're clues. You know, M. Night Shyamalan is like a little bit of a hits bong once guy.

[Sean Fennessey]

You know, he's never smoked pie.

[Jason Concepcion]

A little. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

But just like every. You can see he really is proud of his ideas.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

And he's proud of this idea, but it works. It works. Visually, this is a weird fact. The novelization for young Sherlock Holmes uses the line Sixth Sense. Frank Marshall produced both movies, and Steven Spielberg later directed Hayley Joel Osment in AI Artificial Intelligence, which was also produced. And also produced Holmes.

[Jason Concepcion]

Young Sherlock Holmes still slaps.

[Bill Simmons]

Great movie. Yeah, I'm a big fan of that movie.

[Sean Fennessey]

Hmm.

[Bill Simmons]

All of the clothes Malcolm wears during the film are items he wore or touched the evening before his death, which included his overcoat, his blue rowing sweatshirt, and the different layers of his suit. Though the filmmakers were careful about clues of Malcolm's true state, the camera zooms slowly toward his face when Cole says, I see dead people. In a special feature, the filmmakers mentioned they initially feared this would be too much of a giveaway, decided to leave it in. Okay. This is a weird one. According to M. Night Shyamalan, the movie was inspired by an episode of Are youe Afraid of the Dark?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Called the Tale of the Dream Girl in 1994, directed by David Winning, in which leading characters are ignored by somebody and do not realize that they are dead until the final moment. In the Tale of the Dream Girl, a brother discovers that only his sister can see him, and she ultimately shows him his own obituary.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did you guys ever, when you were kids, like pretend like that another kid in the room wasn't there?

[Jason Concepcion]

No. You weirdo.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, you're a psycho.

[Jason Concepcion]

I don't know.

[Sean Fennessey]

You never did that for real?

[Bill Simmons]

You bullied children into believing they were dead?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, we were just having fun.

[Jason Concepcion]

We were just having a laugh.

[Sean Fennessey]

You guys never did that?

[Jason Concepcion]

This PC culture these days won't allow you to ignore a kid until he believes he's dead. Snowflakes.

[Bill Simmons]

Respect all dead kids.

[Sean Fennessey]

Chris.

[Bill Simmons]

All right, I mentioned the Munchausen by Proxy syndrome aspect of the story. The soundtrack release of this movie gives away the ending. The final song on the CD is called Malcolm is Dead. Come on.

[Sean Fennessey]

The thing is, that actually is pretty common. Like when you go and when you look at the Moneyball soundtrack, it's like, we won the pennant, but it's not.

[Bill Simmons]

John Williams doesn't write Darth Vader is Luke's father.

[Sean Fennessey]

Right.

[Bill Simmons]

That's not a song.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's my favorite song.

[Bill Simmons]

Any other half ass Internet research you wanted to point out?

[Sean Fennessey]

No. I'm so shamed by trying to connect with you guys and you're dunking on me.

[Jason Concepcion]

Sorry.

[Bill Simmons]

Apex Mountain. M. Night Shyamalan.

[Sean Fennessey]

By the top of the Himalayas.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah. I mean, this is. You would know better than I. Isn't this one of the most profitable movies of all time?

[Bill Simmons]

Definitely.

[Jason Concepcion]

I mean, yeah. This is his absolute pinnacle and set the template for the rest of his career.

[Bill Simmons]

The only movie that I can really, I feel comfortable comparing it to from a cultural impact perspective, from an award season perspective, and from a profitability perspective. And essentially the launching of a filmmaker is Get Out. Get out is really one of the only examples I can think of a person who instantaneously transformed their life and career with one movie that had a great idea. And get out similarly, is premised on a great idea. And so is the Sixth Sense. And that can happen for a filmmaker. Bruce Willis, Apex Mountain.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, Absolutely not.

[Jason Concepcion]

No.

[Bill Simmons]

Haley Jill Osment.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yes. I would like to ask whether or not this represents a shorter peak of Willis. I'm trying to break it down here because where is 6th Sense 99? You know, I mean, he was still doing. He was on a pretty good run here in the late 90s, I guess with Armageddon and the Siege. So, no, obviously Die Hard is his Apex Mountain.

[Jason Concepcion]

This is like one of the. This 98 is absolutely bizarre.

[Bill Simmons]

Run it down.

[Jason Concepcion]

Mercury Rising quietly but interesting early on. I think it's kind of.

[Bill Simmons]

Is there a kid performance in that one too?

[Jason Concepcion]

There's a kid performance. He sees the code that is like, about assassinations.

[Bill Simmons]

Right, right, right.

[Jason Concepcion]

Armageddon, which I'm on record as, you know, it's the most entertaining right wing movie of all time. The Siege, which has become prescient now. Ally McBeal.

[Bill Simmons]

Whoa.

[Jason Concepcion]

Well, sorry, that was. No, that's over. So the Siege. And then the Siege. So the Siege. That is just wild.

[Bill Simmons]

And he plays like a militant army general. Right?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah. He's the reluctant. He's the guy who's like, don't make me do this. And the president is like, you have to. And then he goes in and he's like. He's a fucking asshole.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

So it is Haley Joel's Apex Mountain.

[Sean Fennessey]

We agree.

[Bill Simmons]

Toni Collette. Now, any other nominees? Tak Fujimoto.

[Sean Fennessey]

Trevor Morgan.

[Bill Simmons]

We're getting to Trevor Morgan.

[Jason Concepcion]

Tommy T. I mean, Donnie Wahlberg. No, it's probably. It's Band of Brothers.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. The Joey Pants Award. I've got Glen Fitzgerald as Sean. You familiar with Sean? Olivia Williams would be Param. Paramore.

[Sean Fennessey]

I am very tough for him.

[Bill Simmons]

He's a real. That guy.

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

I've also got Bruce Norris as Stanley Cunningham. Stuttering Stanley, the teacher. You guys know Bruce Norris is one of the most celebrated playwrights of his generation.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did not know that.

[Bill Simmons]

He's a longtime member of the Steppenwolf group. Oh.

[Jason Concepcion]

Like.

[Bill Simmons]

And has written some award winning play.

[Sean Fennessey]

So he cole make up after he flips out at him.

[Bill Simmons]

I guess so.

[Sean Fennessey]

Because at the end he's like ready, ready to go out there. Stable guy, you know.

[Bill Simmons]

I guess they do. Any other Joey Pants nominees? No.

[Sean Fennessey]

I'm going to go Norris though.

[Bill Simmons]

You're going Norris?

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's a good one.

[Bill Simmons]

Check out Bruce Norris playwriting. Apparently it's quite good. I haven't read it. Saul Rubinick award for overacting m night as Dr. Hill.

[Sean Fennessey]

Pretty understated performance. Just a lot to cast yourself in that role.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes, quite a bit.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay.

[Bill Simmons]

I disagree. Bruce Norris, Stanley Cunningham and Trevor Morgan as Tommy Tomasino.

[Jason Concepcion]

He's doing a lot with his face.

[Sean Fennessey]

He gets more backstory than almost any other character in this movie.

[Jason Concepcion]

He gets a tremendous amount of backstory. And we get to see the commercial.

[Sean Fennessey]

You get to see his commercial. He talks about improv. He's a bully.

[Jason Concepcion]

He gets a whole arc. Really? Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's like when I say, oh, they didn't. This movie is unencumbered by B plot. Cause Thomasimo is taking up the entire beatbox.

[Jason Concepcion]

We get that comeuppance of him as the bit character in the plot.

[Sean Fennessey]

J Village Idiot. They're like village idiot. And it's like.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah. And we get that tight two shot with his face where we can read the disappointment of not being cast as King Arthur. And it is satisfying.

[Sean Fennessey]

It's just so weird when he's like, did you like how I put my arm around you, freak?

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's called improvised.

[Jason Concepcion]

What?

[Sean Fennessey]

That is wild. M Night. Meet One child. No one talks like that.

[Bill Simmons]

I feel like it's actually a subtle commentary on what most child actors are like and how much they suck and how good Haley Joel Osment is.

[Sean Fennessey]

Trevor's performance.

[Bill Simmons]

Just that whole character that you need a great child actor in this movie to make it work. And you've cast a shithead child actor character. I mean, you heard it here first from the stars of Take Hunter. This is a bad performance by Trevor Morgan.

[Sean Fennessey]

Did you know many times Trevor Morgan would go on to play young Dexter Holland in the music video version of Christie? Are you doing okay? By the Offspring Iconic.

[Bill Simmons]

Christy, are you doing okay? Can you hum a little bit of that?

[Sean Fennessey]

Actually, I'm unfamiliar with that tune.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

Can you hum it?

[Bill Simmons]

No.

[Sean Fennessey]

Okay. Are you pretending like I'm dead now?

[Bill Simmons]

Keep on this line and then we'll see how far we get. I think that's more than enough about Trevor Morgan, who is definitely the winner of the Saul Rubinick Award for overacting. This is the sound of your ride.

[Jason Concepcion]

Home with dad after he caught you vaping.

[Bill Simmons]

Awkward, isn't it? Most vapes contain seriously addictive levels of nicotine and disappointment.

[Jason Concepcion]

Know the real cost of vapes brought to you by the fda.

[Bill Simmons]

Picking nits.

[Sean Fennessey]

He was in the Patriot as well with Gibson.

[Bill Simmons]

Cool. Should we cancel him?

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't know. I feel like I might need to do some long form on Trevor. From Thomasimo to the revolutionary war to SoCal skate punk.

[Jason Concepcion]

I smell a 10,000 word cover feature right here.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I see Dead Patriots.

[Sean Fennessey]

Juliet to do a special build for this.

[Bill Simmons]

Moving on. Picking nits. You know, I don't know how much of this we want to do. I think if you can really take apart a lot of the continuity errors and mistakes in this movie, there's a lot of stuff the Internet points out a lot of things where like a blanket is up against somebody's neck and then in the next shot it's down at their waist or there's, you know, somebody's wearing a shirt one way and then there's a button buttoned up or there's a patch of hair that is stray. A lot of this stuff comes from trying to make a complicated movie and being A fairly unseasoned filmmaker. I don't really want to dig into too much of that stuff.

[Sean Fennessey]

I have one though.

[Bill Simmons]

Go ahead.

[Sean Fennessey]

I don't. It's a picking. It's an unanswerable question, I guess, but I have some questions about the funeral.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay.

[Sean Fennessey]

And just what the vibe would be like if a little kid brought you a VHS tape. Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

That was a little bit at your.

[Sean Fennessey]

Daughter'S funeral and was like walking in without an adult. Yeah.

[Jason Concepcion]

Who is this kid?

[Sean Fennessey]

Just a little kid with a box.

[Jason Concepcion]

Just gonna hunt in the dead girl's room for a bit. Is that okay?

[Sean Fennessey]

And then comes up to you and he's just like, here's this box. And you're like, cool, let me watch this right now. Let me watch this at my daughter's funeral. And then the wife is like, damn, red handed. Owned. She's just like. There's no. Like, hey, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. What are we doing here? She's just like, shit, kid. Detective. Caught me. That's the only Scooby Doo moment of this movie, right?

[Jason Concepcion]

The fact that there's no extensive police interview. Excuse me, young man. How did you come to arrive at this funeral of a girl who you do not know, to then find the evidence of her murder underneath her bed, a place you have never been before. Can we discuss this for a bit? The fact that that is not discussed at all with the law enforcement of Philadelphia is wild.

[Bill Simmons]

There's a lot of suspension of disbelief.

[Sean Fennessey]

Those guys are all those cops are just eating sour cream.

[Bill Simmons]

They're like, yeah, those pen made fat bastards. Too busy schmearing it all over a bagel. Okay. There is one weird nitpick though, that I did notice when I was watching it and then it was confirmed on the Internet, which is the. During the I see dead people scene, which is the most rewatched scene in the movie. Cole is facing Malcolm and a tear runs down his face. When Cole turns away, his face is dry with no trace of a tear. We gotta do better than that. Shades of Bob Myers. Let's go right to best quote. I could go down the list. There are actually quite a few interesting interactions. I don't know if there are a ton of standalone singular quotes, but obviously the conversation between Cole and Lyn at the end in the car is kind of a masterclass in revealing screenwriting, I think. You ever feel the prickly things on the back of your neck and the.

[Jason Concepcion]

Tiny hairs on your arm, you know, when they stand up?

[Bill Simmons]

Yes.

[Jason Concepcion]

That'S them.

[Sean Fennessey]

When they get mad.

[Bill Simmons]

That'S Very good. I want to tell you my secret now. There are a couple of things like that that I think work really well. I don't want to be scared anymore. A lot of coal stuff is what works the best. She says she's sorry for taking the bumblebee pendant. She just likes it a lot. Yeah, I did enjoy Keep moving cheese dick.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah, I stopped on that one as well. Is that a thing that people say in Philly?

[Sean Fennessey]

Constantly.

[Jason Concepcion]

Really? Cheese dick.

[Sean Fennessey]

No, I've never heard it before.

[Bill Simmons]

I do think that there's no question that the best quote is I see dead people. Right? Yeah, it has to be.

[Sean Fennessey]

I see. It's kind of like. It's sort of like the Apex Mountain.

[Jason Concepcion]

It became a meme before we knew what that was.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, I see dead people. Could this work as a 10 episode Netflix show in 2019?

[Sean Fennessey]

God, no.

[Jason Concepcion]

It could work as a five episode Netflix show.

[Sean Fennessey]

First of all, I'll tell you why somebody would watch it the first night and be like, holy shit, the twist at the end of the Sixth Sense. A show that came out last night that you haven't had 10 hours to watch yet.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a good point.

[Sean Fennessey]

So that wouldn't work. And I just think that unless you're going to really, really delve into Tom Simo, what do you spend times, what are you spending those 10 hours doing? And also, like, the more you show him interacting with Olivia Williams, the more Willis interacts with, the more I think skeptical people would get. It's like, okay, she still has not talked to him. This movie is exactly the right running time.

[Bill Simmons]

I agree with you guys. Unanswerable questions. Philly classic.

[Sean Fennessey]

That's an answerable one. Yeah, totally. Philly classic. It's on the Rushmore.

[Jason Concepcion]

Nice.

[Bill Simmons]

Okay, this is, I think, the key unanswerable question, but we can have opinions about it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure.

[Bill Simmons]

Is this a good movie if you already know the ending going in.

[Sean Fennessey]

So this was the first time I rewatched this movie in at least a decade. And I would say that I was entertained but not emotionally involved. Okay, so I think the answer is somewhat for me.

[Bill Simmons]

What do you think, Jason?

[Jason Concepcion]

I'm going to say yes, both from a structural standpoint. It's just really interesting to see how right in front of you the tells are and then to analyze, why didn't I see this stuff? And then from an emotional standpoint, the car conversation at the end still bangs for me. That really, absolutely hits it. Crushes. I got emotional watching it again.

[Sean Fennessey]

So many of the movies we talk about on Rewatchables are rewatchable for a line of dialogue or a particularly poignant moment or a particularly funny moment, or you start to notice, like, oh, the details in the Pacino performance that you never saw before. This is not that. I don't think. I think the performances are, like, they're on purpose, flat. The dialogue is very generic in a lot of ways. Like, a lot of the stories they tell are just kind of like, what the hell are you talking about? So I don't think it has a lot of the same resonance that a lot of rewatchable movies do have, but I think from just appreciating the mechanics of it, like you're saying, it's still a remarkable movie. What about you?

[Bill Simmons]

Do you like? Well, I did see it after having it spoiled for me, and so the first time I saw it, you're not letting that go. Hugely anticlimactic. No. But it radically alters how you experience it.

[Sean Fennessey]

Sure. Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

And I've come to admire it more and more over time. And like Jason, I remember loving Unbreakable and Loving Signs and liking the Village a lot. And I remember believing in his storytelling power. Probably too much so in hindsight. Yeah.

[Sean Fennessey]

But it can't be sort of underrated that for people our age, he and Tarantino, while nowhere close to being alike as filmmakers, were kind of like the kind of guys where you're like, could I do this? Could I work at a video store and then become a guy? Could I be 29 and be a filmmaker and make my version of ET or my version of Raiders? And it seemed a little bit more in touching distance.

[Bill Simmons]

That's very true.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

I think with that, it kind of answers who won the movie. I think it has to be M. Night Shyamalan.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yes.

[Bill Simmons]

There's a case for Haley Joel, who obviously has sort of revived his career in the last four or five years, done some funny stuff in the Entourage movie. He's done some serious performances in movies of late. But, I mean, M. Night Shyamalan basically becomes a movie industry for the next 10 years.

[Sean Fennessey]

And the fact that he's come back around, did the last one do well?

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah, like I said, slightly underperformed, but still. I mean, glass probably cost $30 million to make and made $200 million. You know what I mean? He has figured out something, especially in working with Blumhouse, that I think is just going to allow him to continue to be successful because he eventizes his movies.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah. And it's so interesting for kind of like, the socioeconomic sphere that his movies exist in. I was thinking about this. Is there even such a thing as a sleeper hit anymore? Like, in the same way that the Sixth Sense was a sleeper hit, I.

[Sean Fennessey]

Guess Wick would be, like, in some ways, like, I mean, there's hits that are kind of like, catch on on demand.

[Jason Concepcion]

Right.

[Sean Fennessey]

I think it's more likely that a show. A TV show becomes a sleeper hit.

[Bill Simmons]

I agree.

[Sean Fennessey]

Like, Stranger Things, where it's like, that kind of ruled out and nobody knew anything about it. And then all of a sudden, it became a phenomenon.

[Bill Simmons]

This movie had a very. Had a pretty successful opening weekend, but it had a long tail. And I think the thing that's really changed about moviegoing is that there is no long tail anymore. Unless you're endgame. It's very hard to get people to come out in week 10 of release to see a movie. And so I guess in that respect. No. That sort of consistency in theaters for a long period of time. I think you're right, Chris. I think that the sleeper hit is the TV. It's you saying 10 days after it's out. Did you watch the Society?

[Sean Fennessey]

Yeah, right.

[Bill Simmons]

You know, like, there's some cool stuff in that that we should talk about that is more likely to kind of gain steam over time. Guys, any other final thoughts on the Sixth Sense?

[Sean Fennessey]

No, I mean, I just revisiting these 99 movies, it just. It's so nostalgic for not only, like, the films themselves, but for the way in which I, you know, interface with pop culture back then. So it's always such a trip to go back and talk about these things. Cause it really, really was a different time.

[Jason Concepcion]

Yeah.

[Bill Simmons]

Jason, what was the best movie you saw while working in a movie theater in 1989?

[Jason Concepcion]

Run Lola Run.

[Sean Fennessey]

Ooh. Ooh. Huh.

[Jason Concepcion]

Like, I walked out of the theater and I had that thing of, you know, when you play Grand Theft Auto for too long and then you get behind the wheel of a car and you're like, actually, I shouldn't drive it. Was that where I was like, if I walk out into traffic and get hit by a car right now, will my life start over? I really was, like, mentally broken for a couple of hours after that movie, just thinking about, like, time and the way time can arc and branch. And also, that's just such a kinetic. Like, there's not a spare moment in that movie. It's so kinetic and lean.

[Bill Simmons]

That's a great answer. I feel like something that that movie and so many of the other movies we're talking about on this series in particular is that they were just purely unpredictable. You had no idea where they were going.

[Sean Fennessey]

Transporting.

[Bill Simmons]

Yeah. Even in a Marvel movie, you know, ultimately, like, we have a general sense of where things are gonna go, even if it surprises you. That's part of what makes these 1999 movies so great. Thanks for listening to the Rewatchables 1999 presented by Luminary Media.

[Chris Ryan]

All right, that's it for the podcast. Thanks to Sean and C.R. and old friend Jason Concepcion. Thanks to Craig Horlbeck for producing as always. And we will be back with an absolute world class heater of a banger next week on the Rewatchables. Don't forget, Ringer movies is the YouTube channel if you want to subscribe to that. See you next week.