Sonatine

REVIEW
Danger After Dark:
One of the best films to emerge from Quentin Tarantino’s short-lived Rolling Thunder Pictures releasing banner, Sonatine also stands as one of the quintessential works of Japanese director/writer/actor/all-around cultural icon “Beat” Takeshi Kitano. Kitano’s films have largely alternated between violent yakuza tales (Violent Cop, Boiling Point, and the American-lensed Brother) and droll low-key comedies (Kikujiro, Kids Return), but his best work, which includes Sonatine and Fireworks, strikes a delicate balance between those two classifications—blood-drenched, fatalistic crime sagas that nonetheless possess a dry, deadpan wit and masterful use of minimalist composition. As a result, Sonatine is just as much Jacques Tati and Jim Jarmusch as it is Kinji Fukasaku and Jean-Pierre Melville. Kitano (who began as a comedian and television personality in Japan before moving into directing) stars as a Tokyo yakuza ganglord who takes a forced vacation with his underlings to an Okinawa beach house, where the normally stoic, brutal yakuza find themselves relaxed and jovial far from the gang warfare back in Tokyo. Kitano balances the violence of the crime world with the playfulness and humor of the men’s seaside interactions (no wonder Tarantino is a fan), sustaining a tone that manages to encompass both wit and menace. While Sonatine is one of his most enjoyable films, Kitano has also recently directed two films which surpass (in very different ways) any of his previous work: unfortunately, Dolls and Zatoichi have yet to be released in America, but keep your fingers crossed.