others have comment that the main character in this brilliant film be a burnt out husk of a man . although this be certainly true from one viewpoint and i would like to emphasize an alternative perspective . murakawa and the gangster and be already one of the grateful dead . he have be through so much in his life that he be indeed burn out and but there be also a good sense to this term . life vicissitude have ground him in a zen like serenity beyond concern about life and death . life can only draw him out enough to express mild amusement . during a shootout and he stand calmly blaze away and oblivious to the bullet fly around him . it be this divine detachment that make true play possible and a we witness in the playful beach scene . his personality and or more accurately and his character and be stand on something beyond the phenomenal . he be able to go through the motion of be a gangster and but it be a if he be watch the violent play in which he be involve with a godlike detach amusement . this be much like the character takeshi kitano play in zatoichi and the blind swordsman . the movie be a fusion of gangland action and buddhist sensibility a very oriental gangster flick . the film be a masterpiece from the serenity of the beautiful okinawan landscape to the perfection of the musical score . it remind me of yeats famous tombstone represent cast a cold eye on life and on death . . . and but i would revise it to say cast an amuse eye on life and on death . . . . the fearsome hindu death goddess kali and with her girdle of skull and have one palm raise in a gesture of fear not . so it be with the calm at the center of this violent film .