Hana-Bi (Fireworks)

A wonderfully moving, visually interesting and innovative in its use of artwork, late 90's film from Takeshi Kitano.
It does take a while to get going, the puzzles take a while to unfold into patterned jigsaws. This makes the opening have some interesting visual tics that will be repeated through out the rest of the film, along with its excellent performances.
We immediately have Kitano playing an excellent part, wonderfully reticent but never descending into too-cool monotomy. He conveys his mixed character expertly, with both the tenderness and the violence portrayed believably. The images of him by the car are also notable, and rather cool.
The camera seems to nearly be in the position of the invalid throughout. This certainly gives a sense of passing and transiency well. The wheel chair bound cop is a wondefully evoked and played character, with nice riffs on identity. And then there are the excellent artworks, not extraneous add-ons but genuinely a central part. These are straightforward excellent pieces of art, beautiful, moving, and all that.
The most notable thing of this film is the mix of the distracted, failing, painfully beautiful story of the dying wife, and the contrast of this with the hyper-violence. The latter is clearly an expression of Mr Nishi (Kitano's) internal situation, as well as showing more interesting questions of general linkage. The violence adds something, an unobtainable indescribale 'it', to the tenderness.
So, a film that by its end, after a slightly confused start narrative wise, becomes tender, moving and sublimely beautiful. A real success.