While the moviegoing public - and the Academy - swooned for "The Sixth Sense", I think the similarly-themed "Stir of Echoes" is a far better film. Where the former film is slow and dull right up to its trick ending, "Stir of Echoes" is briskly paced and genuinely haunting; I knew what Kevin Bacon's character would find buried beneath his property, yet the result of his search is still shocking. Kevin Bacon, normally a solid actor, is the film's key weakness (for most of the movie, he seems to be channelling Matt LeBlanc), but all the other performers are fine, and without giving too much away, I will say the last shot paints a very disturbing picture of what the young boy goes through. "Stir of Echoes" did not deserve any Oscar nominations, but it deserved some nominations more than "The Sixth Sense" did.
Review of Stir of Echoes
