Sonatine

‘Beat’ Takeshi Kitano is a nihilist at heart, but he still knows how to play the clown. While Sonatine begins with an archetypal introduction of brooding gangsters and spasms of violence, Kitano gradually saturates the film with affection and a wry sense of humour. A loose band of Yakuza, led by disillusioned boss Murakawa (Kitano), are ordered to curb tensions between two rival gangs in Okinawa. As the situation quickly becomes a disaster, Murakawa retreats to a remote coastal safehouse with the remainder of the group, where they slowly befriend each other and shed their rote Yakuza posturing. The kernel in Sonatine’s tragedy lies in this idyllic kinship; the director makes it clear that we’re only daydreaming a glimpse of what an otherwise improbable redemption might look like. That he elicits genuine empathy for such damaged characters is quite remarkable, especially for someone with an outlook as taciturn as his.