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This is what I wrote about Sonatine in my logbook thread, but with a little bit extra here about the ending of the movie.
http://www.movieforums.com/community...20#post1261420
I kind of have mixed feelings about this movie. It's supposed to be a gangster movie, but while the beginning and the end of the movie make it a gangster movie, the whole middle of the movie doesn't feel like a gangster movie. And the parts of the movie that I liked best were in the middle of the movie.
The middle of the movie is really the heart of the movie. That's where we really meet the characters. We get to know them as real people, not as killers in a gang. It's a bit slow, but that's the part of the movie that's worth watching. The rest of the movie is just about who's killing who, and who's going to make it out of each gunfight alive.
The ending is interesting. It seems like Murakawa finally has his life going in the right direction, but he chooses to end his life instead. He won the last fight so his gang is on top, and he has a girl waiting for him, so why would he choose to kill himself? It actually makes sense if you've been paying attention to the character throughout the movie. He doesn't seem to be a very happy person. He talks about how he's afraid all the time, and how death might be better than the way he lives his life. He seems happiest during his time at the beach when he's away from all the gang activity, so it makes sense that he doesn't want to go back to that kind of life.
http://www.movieforums.com/community...20#post1261420
I kind of have mixed feelings about this movie. It's supposed to be a gangster movie, but while the beginning and the end of the movie make it a gangster movie, the whole middle of the movie doesn't feel like a gangster movie. And the parts of the movie that I liked best were in the middle of the movie.
The middle of the movie is really the heart of the movie. That's where we really meet the characters. We get to know them as real people, not as killers in a gang. It's a bit slow, but that's the part of the movie that's worth watching. The rest of the movie is just about who's killing who, and who's going to make it out of each gunfight alive.
The ending is interesting. It seems like Murakawa finally has his life going in the right direction, but he chooses to end his life instead. He won the last fight so his gang is on top, and he has a girl waiting for him, so why would he choose to kill himself? It actually makes sense if you've been paying attention to the character throughout the movie. He doesn't seem to be a very happy person. He talks about how he's afraid all the time, and how death might be better than the way he lives his life. He seems happiest during his time at the beach when he's away from all the gang activity, so it makes sense that he doesn't want to go back to that kind of life.
