Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai (1999) - Whitaker serves ancient samurai justice in Jarmusch's cool treat

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+ Best New Jersey Movie of the Year + Best Samurai Movie of the Year

The cool poster for Jim Jarmusch's Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai

Ghost Dog is the 7th feature from American master writer-director Jim Jarmusch (Dead Man (1995)). It is an urban samurai movie.

Ghost Dog is a lone samurai, who's a retainer for a mob guy. When a hit he carries out gets witnessed by the boss's daughter, the boss sets out to kill the strange man. But that is easier said than done.

The film opens slowly and starts by driving us into the meditative pace of its title character, as he cruises around New Jersey in a stolen car. The hang-low mood is nicely in line with the chilled beats that are produced by RZA (of The Wu Tang Clan, who also has a cameo towards the end), who makes a deft composer debut here. He has since composed scores for Kill Bill: Vol. 1 (2003) and other things.
Forest Whitaker (The Last King of Scotland (2006)) is Ghost Dog, and Jarmusch also makes good use of his younger brother Damon Whitaker (Bird (1988)) in two flash-back scenes. Ghost Dog has a wonderful row of faces in secondary parts: John Tormey (The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001)) as the hero's complexed employer Louie; Henry Silva (Thirst (1979)) as the reptile-like boss; Cliff Gorman (The Boys in the Band (1970)) as his son, and Victor Argo (Bad Lieutenant (1992)) as a strong-arm. - There are many more, and the gangster ensemble is pretty hilarious; most of them play them straight-faced, as heaving, idiotic fatsoes.
The film also features Isaach De Bankolé (The Limits of Control (2009)) as our hero's French-speaking best friend and Camille Winbush (Eraser (1996)) as the nice literate girl from the park.

The details:


Ghost Dog is infused with several quotations from a samurai book (Yamamoto Tsunetomo's Hagakure (1709-16)), many of which are thought-provoking, (a few nonsensical.) The film sends a warm reference to samurai movie master Akira Kurosawa (through the use of the book Rashômon, which is also the title of his great 1950 film.) It also references Jean-Pierre Melville's Le Samouraï (1967).
Depending on your analytical powers, at some point you will realize that Ghost Dog has a symbolic meaning beneath its cool, violent, wry surface: Ghost Dog symbolizes the profound, ancient traditions and values, while the gangsters symbolize the depravity and indifference and stupidity of today. Ghost Dog carries out his justified vengeance as a kind of blast from the past, especially poignant in the scenes with the racist poachers.
It isn't necessary to buy into the samurai philosophy or way of life to treasure Ghost Dog. For most who love samurai movies and Jarmusch pictures, Ghost Dog is simply a wonderful gift that came as perhaps the last great samurai movie before the arrival of the new millennium.


Related posts:

Jim Jarmusch: Broken Flowers (2005) - Hip search for son and self with Jarmusch and Murray
Coffee and Cigarettes (2003) - Pleasant, precious vignette sit-down with some wonderful people  

1999 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess 

 

Watch the trailer here

Cost: 2 mil. $
Box office: 9.3 mil. $
= Big hit
[Ghost Dog made 3.3 mil. $ or 35 % of its gross in the States. It was popular in many countries, especially France, where it also was nominated for the Palm d'Or in Cannes, (but didn't win.)]


What do you think of Jarmusch's samurai movie?
What's your favorite samurai movie?

Bad Lieutenant (1992) or, World of Hurt

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A resigned and inebriated, fully naked star Harvey Keitel poses on this poster for Abel Ferrrara's Bad Lieutenant

Harvey Keitel (Lansky (2021)) plays a corrupt New York lieutenant, who uses whores, steals, gambles and takes lots of drugs to stand himself. But the rape of a nun and an escalating gambling debt becomes the end for him.
 

Bad Lieutenant is written by Zoë Lund (Ms. 45 (1981), actress) and New-Yorker master filmmaker, co-writer/director Abel Ferrara (The Driller Killer (1979)), whose 7th feature it is.

This is a film I cannot recommend warmly enough.
Bad Lieutenant is made with a stripped nerve, stripped feelings and soul. It is a hard-core New York movie, so if you don't know the city or the abrasive way that New Yorkers can be, you'll definitely be put off by the characters you meet in Bad Lieutenant, not least of them the protagonist himself.
Nevertheless , the film gives a realistic and stinging picture of our world and is at the same time a tribute to the power of Jesus Christ

Keitel is totally amazing as the demon-plagued, drug-addict lieutenant: SPOILER His confrontation with his maker and his feelings of being left by God, the nun's forgiveness and his own salvation in the end by his awe-inspiring and shocking action raises the film up to its level as a unique marvel, a true masterpiece. It is also Ferrara's strongest film by a landslide.

 
Related posts:

 

Abel Ferrara: Body Snatcherrs (1993) - Third Snatchers adaptation is a piece of mediocre Ferrara

1992 in films - according to Film Excess 
Top 10: Best drug-themed movies reviewed by Film Excess to date

Top 10: Best cop movies reviewed by Film Excess to date 

The Driller Killer (1979) - Ferrara's unsettling, original psycho-thriller debut 
Unrelated follow-up: The Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans/Bad Lieutenant (2009) or, Werner Herzog's Bad Lieutenant

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 1 mil. $
Box office: In excess of 2 mil. $ (North America alone)
= Uncertain

[Bad Lieutenant premiered 14 May (Cannes Film Festival, out of competition) and runs 96 minutes. Lund claims that she was more responsible for the script than Ferrara; both were addicted to drugs during the making of the film. Shooting took place from October - November 1991 in New York and New Jersey. The film made 2 mil. $ in North America, and its foreign gross numbers are regrettably unreported online. It sold 14,872 tickets in the small market of Denmark, coming to approximately 123k $, indicating that the film did relatively good business abroad: It was released in 16 foreign markets. The actual final gross could very well be closer to 4 mil. $, which would make the film a big hit. It won 1/3 Independent Spirit award nominations. Roger Ebert gave it a 4/4 star review, equal in rating to this one. The film's producer Edward R. Pressman followed up the film with an unrelated sequel, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans (2009), by Werner Herzog, starring Nicolas Cage. Ferrara returned with Body Snatchers (1993). Keitel returned in Sister Act (1992). Bad Lieutenant is certified fresh at 76 % with a 7.20/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of Bad Lieutenant?