27 Years Ago, Audiences Were Stunned By A Mind-Blowing Movie Twist That May Never Be Topped

27 years ago, the arrival of writer/director M. Night Shyamalan’s iconic supernatural mystery in theatres set a new standard for horror movie twist endings, and the legendary last-minute revelation has arguably never been topped since.  Twist endings are far trickier than they seem. For every great ending that completely changes everything that came before the third act, stunning viewers in the process, there are plenty of predictable twist endings that were entirely unnecessary or, worse, actively hurt their movies.

That said, some all-time great twist endings are so effective that they end up setting a new standard for their genre in years to come. While there have been plenty of great crime thrillers in the decades since The Usual Suspects was released in 1995, it is fair to say that no movie in the genre has managed to outdo that mystery’s infamous last-second revelation. Similarly, although there are plenty of great 21st-century horror movies, 1999’s $672 million box-office phenomenon The Sixth Sense still has the genre’s best twist ending.

The Sixth Sense Premiered On August 6, 1999 And Set The New Gold Standard For Movie Twists

A rare horror movie that was nominated for numerous Oscars, including Best Picture, Best Director, and Best Original Screenplay, The Sixth Sense starred Bruce Willis as the troubled child psychologist Malcolm Crowe. After a traumatising encounter with a former patient, Crowe begins working with a disturbed boy who claims he can see and communicate with ghosts. Without giving away the movie’s seminal ending, suffice to say, Malcolm soon learns in no uncertain terms that this child is telling the truth.

While a re-watch proves that The Sixth Sense is both a compelling character drama about grief and trauma and a chilling horror even without its big twist ending to rely on, it is still important to highlight just how ingenious the movie’s central reveal is. While Shyamalan’s later career was dotted with twists that didn’t work as well, as the writer/director continually attempted to one-up his iconic breakout hit, his inconsistency shouldn’t hurt the reputation of this era-defining classic.

Referenced in everything from The Haunting of Bly Manor to the superb horror-comedy Widow’s Bay, The Sixth Sense’s twist is one of those ingenious endings that re-contextualizes the entire preceding story while still making perfect sense. The movie is satisfying upon a re-watch precisely because The Sixth Sense actually makes more sense after the twist, with all the strange or jarring aspects of the plot suddenly coming into sharp relief.

1999 Was An Iconic Year For Unforgettable Twist Endings

Interestingly enough, the turn of the millennium was a year defined by not one, but many great twist endings. The Sixth Sense was a gigantic box office hit, but director David Fincher’s future cult classic Fight Club featured a bombshell twist ending that was almost as incredible as Shyamalan’s famous revelation.

Meanwhile, although the movie never quite gained the same level of fame as The Sixth Sense and Fight Club, the conspiracy thriller Arlington Road boasts a downbeat coda that left viewers and critics stunned. While the following year’s 2000 horror movies might have been a mixed bag, it is hard to deny the fact that, thanks in large part to M. Night Shyamalan’s The Sixth Sense, 1999 was the year of the mind-blowing twist ending.