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Classics Revisited Movie: The Sixth Sense, starring Bruce Willis and Haley Joel Osment The Sixth Sense and the Shadow By psychologist Dr. Bruce L. Thiessen, aka Dr. BLT, The Shrink-rappin' Rock Doc Much was missed when critics initially reviewed the movie, Sixth Sense. The parallels between key elements of the movie (namely, the movie's story line, characters, and motifs), and the quintessential elements underlying the seminal theoretical work of Carl G. Jung were most conspicuously absent in the initial reviews. Since art critics have accepted Jungian psychoanalysis as a primary basis for art criticism for years, it is surprising that such parallels were missed. In short, I see parallels! My goal is to get you, the reader, to see them too, so that you can broaden your basis for appreciating and further understanding the significance of this unmatched movie. The Story This is a story involving a mysterious journey into unknown territory that lies beyond the grave. It revolves around the initially disturbing paranormal experience of a young boy named Cole and his interaction with a doctor who would become his rescuer. The story begins with a memorable scene involving the doctor, a prominent Philadelphia psychologist, and his wife, engaging in a quiet, intimate celebration of an award he receives, and the unexpected and ultimately lethal arrival of an uninvited "guest"-an intruder, who was once a child-patient of the psychologist. The once child-patient is a woefully distressed, disgruntled one, who was apparently misdiagnosed by the psychologist, treated (or should I say mistreated?) accordingly, and then prematurely released, only to deteriorate to an abysmal, chaotic and painful psychological state. The once-child-patient-now- psychotically 'unhinged'-adult-child, ends up shooting and killing the doctor. The spirit of the deceased doctor is transported to another time and another place, involving another child-patient-one who bears an uncanny resemblance to the patient-turned-perpetrator as he presented himself to the doctor in his childhood years. The doctor has apparently been provided with an opportunity to redeem himself for his past failure by intervening in the life of this little boy-a boy unbearably haunted by the dead. After building what is known as a therapeutic alliance with the boy, and establishing a relationship with the boy based upon trust, the boy finally shares his secret, contained in a now classic line, "I see dead people." The doctor, not realizing that he is one of those "dead people" that his patient sees, ultimately leads his patient to the simple solution. That solution is to confront, to listen, to solve the conundrums, and to ultimately ease the burdens of the dead people who haunt the young boy. Once Cole confronts instead of running from the dead spirits, his fear gradually begins to dissipate and he's even able to resolve a mystery about how a young girl is murdered, bringing closure to grieving family members and justice to the victim. The story, and, more specifically, Cole's life and the defining aspects of his character, are redolent of the life and personality of one of the fathers of modern psychotherapy, Carl G. Jung. Cole, the Young Character, and Carl as a 'Jung' Boy There are distinctive parallels that emerge as one juxtaposes the fictional character of Cole, the mysteriously gifted little boy in the movie played by Academy Award nominee Haley Joel Osment, and the historically documented character of Carl Jung as a boy, as depicted in his retrospective autobiographical, Memories, Dreams, Reflections. Both boys were intense, serious, and prone to intellectual curiosity. Both boys harbored secrets of their unusual abilities to tap into paranormal processes and access mysterious psychic realms, inaccessible to those with whom each interacted on a daily basis. Both created secret shrines, designed to ward off danger, each containing one or more toy(s) or model figure(s). For Cole, these were toy soldiers who offered him protection and communicated to him in the abstruse language of Latin. For Jung, it was a manikin that he carved out of wood-one that he kept in a matchbox, and communicated with via scrolls containing secret messages. This figure was one that he initially believed was drawn from his imagination, but he later discovered it represented an Egyptian mummy, an indigenous figure reflecting a universal archetype, gleaned from the reservoirs of his collective unconscious. According to most experts, to be able to perceive and meaningfully interpret abstract, symbolic information, children must have advanced in years to at least early adolescence. For seminal developmental theorist Jean Piaget, these abilities would be considered features of what he referred to as the Formal Operational Stage of development. Since both of these boys had a keen interest in symbols and their meanings while in their pre-teens years, they can be deemed intellectually advanced beyond their years. Both Carl Jung as a boy and the fictional character of Cole were considered social outcasts. In Cole's case, classmates nicknamed him "Freak." Jung was also ridiculed and rejected by a "jury" of his peers. Both isolated themselves from human contact as much as possible and this further reinforced their serious, intense, intellectually inquisitive dispositions. Both the "Jung" boy and Cole were simultaneously fascinated and repelled by the concept of death as well as the experiential aspects of death. Carl Jung was fascinated by the death of his father as he witnessed it first hand, even before the more predictable stages of the grieving process had an opportunity to settle in. Cole's fascination with death, obfuscated by his intense fear, controlled many of his thoughts and much of his outward behavior. Though there may be other parallels between Cole and Carl, the aforementioned ones are, without a doubt, the most obvious. Mythological Motifs The movie Sixth Sense and the theories of Carl Jung each contain similar motifs: boldly following one's intuition; determinedly digging up the past in order to understand and cope with the present and the future; boldly confronting death and boldly confronting and incorporating the dark, mysterious side of the human condition. In Jung's case, this dark, mysterious side was something he referred to as "the shadow." In Jung's scheme, the shadow was an archetype containing those hidden, dissociated elements of personality that are shunned in childhood and that haunt one into the adult years, at least until the shadow has been acknowledged, confronted, and integrated into the whole of personality. In both the movie and the life and theories of Carl Jung it is discovered that one must exhume "bones" and assume the role of psychological archeologist if one is to conquer the sting of death and shine a light on the darkness of mystery. Diggin' Up Bones One of Randy Travis's signature hits is “Diggin' Up Bones.” In this haunting country ballad, the main character in the song/story is depicted digging up relics of a relationship that has died. In the song, the character seems to lack knowledge and insight into the question of why he is wallowing a past that is "dead and gone." The discovery of "why?" is not revealed in the song. But the "why" is revealed in the movie Sixth Sense in Carl Jung through his personal journey and in a song involving a similar motif-a song by Peter Gabriel entitled, “Digging in the Dirt.” In the song, Gabriel's main character (most likely himself), must dig up, and then resurrect memories of a traumatic childhood in order to bring himself back to life spiritually and psychologically. Motifs are recurrent themes that are manifested again and again through literature, live dramatic adaptations, movies, and music, come from those human experiences that reflect universal principles. The recurrent theme of the voice of the dead being very much alive, but often repressed, is such a theme. Professor Arnold Wienstein of Brown University deftly explores it in his lecture series on “Classics of American Literature.” He cites passages extracted from the classic works of Toni Morrison, Faulkner, and Edgar Allen Poe to demonstrate the motif of "burying people alive," what he refers to as "a perfect image of history." Whether we are speaking of the "prickling legacy of slavery in Morrison," as Brown refers to it, or the "fratricidal fantasies of Faulkner," we must acknowledge that, in a very powerful sense, as Brown exclaims, "...the dead are not dead." And we, like the fictional character of Cole, and the real-life character of Carl Jung as a boy, must listen to the choir of individual and collective voices from the past. If we do not, how can we learn from their individual and collective stories? How will be ever be able to apply them to our present existence? How will we transform our existence from mere, mundane existence to meaningful and liberating existence by burying the dead alive? Consider if you will, Charles Dickens's Ebenezer Scrooge in “A Christmas Carol.” He is forced to listen to the voices and stories of the dead-voices and spirits that he has buried alive in order to justify and rationalize his selfish, spiritually depraved and meaningless existence. When he finally begins to listen to the living voices of the dead, he discovers an enduring redemption that will empower him to change for the sake of the present and the future. Jung didn't invent the motif involving conquering death by facing it head-on. Morrison didn't either. Though they made hay out of it, neither did Faulkner or Edgar Allen Poe invent it. The author who wrote the story of redemption in the hearts of men and women also invented this motif. The story of redemption, told through redemptive history, has a happy ending. In this story, we see Jesus, as he becomes a living paragon who lives out the motifs I am attempting to illustrate. Jesus faced his mysterious side-the paradox of his human and simultaneously divine nature, with rare boldness and courage. Similarly, he faced his own death, voluntarily, and with the utmost courage (with the exception of a moment of pleading with his heavenly father to "take this cup from me," while he hung precariously on the cross of Calvary). In doing so, Christ defeated death for all time. Like Carl Jung and the fictional character of Cole in the movie Sixth Sense, we may now follow our dreams without being afraid of our shadows, as we confidently re-assert the rhetorical question, "...Death, where is thy sting?"
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