The ultimate Renaissance man

Interview, March, 1998 by J. Hoberman

A fifty-one-year-old college dropout who broke into show business as a burlesque-theater elevator boy, Kitano is a ubiquitous, seven-nights-a-week TV personality in Japan - not to mention a superstar actor, best-selling novelist, sports commentator, and, recently, painter (which he took up while recovering from a near-fatal motorcycle accident). This unique amalgam of Clint Eastwood and Howard Stern is best known stateside for playing the affably brutal Sergeant Ham in Nagisa Oshima's Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (1983) and the heavy in Robert Longo's Johnny Mnemonic (1995). Film buffs prize the six movies Kitano has directed since his 1989 Violent Cop - appearing in five of them as a stolid, somewhat shambling bruiser so square that he's cool.

Slightly quizzical, smiling no more than once or twice a movie, Kitano is most expressive when he's socking someone. (In Japan, Jolt supercaffeinated soda chose him as its corporate spokesman.) Given the havoc he wreaks in character, however, Kitano is a surprisingly classical filmmaker, making exceedingly precise use of camera placement and postdubbed sound. Along with a fondness for one-shot scenes, Kitano's specialty is scenes depicting startling eruptions of Impassively watched, noncathartic violence. A bloody gunfight is as likely to occur inside a crowded elevator as it is to be shown in extreme long shot, illuminating the darkened rooms of a high-rise office suite like a distant electrical storm.

Kitano's idea of a visual gag is the premature ejaculation of a machine gun concealed in a floral bouquet. But, concerned about America's reputation for violence, he seldom visits these shores. When he last did, we spoke in the Tatami Suite of the Kitano Hotel (no relation), perhaps the most Japanese place in Midtown Manhattan.

J. HOBERMAN: Are you really the most popular figure in the history of Japanese TV?

TAKESHI KITANO: I have two comedy shows, a program on science, and a program on art. I host a talk show, and I'm also a panelist on a discussion program.

JH: Every week? What's your schedule like?

TK: While making a movie, I do ten days of TV programs and then ten days of shooting. Otherwise I do ten days of TV programs and ten days of writing books and essays for my weekly columns.

JH: You must be the hardest-working man in show business.

TK: That I'm able to accomplish all this only proves how halfheartedly I do the TV. Japanese television is not a serious place. I do completely foolish things, like run around the studio half-naked, which would be inappropriate in film.

JH: Was your role in Violent Cop a change in image for you?

TK: Not really. By the time it was released, I had already appeared in three TV dramas as a serious violent criminal.

JH: Aren't those your paintings done by the disabled cop in Fireworks?

TK: Yes. I began painting after my motorcycle accident. When I was rewriting the Fireworks scenario, it occurred to me to make the character Horibe a novice painter. Strangely enough, all the paintings I had done fit into the story.

JH: There's a symmetry between Horibe and his partner, Nishi, whom you play. They're like two sides of the same personality.

TK: Before the accident in the movie, Horibe leads a happy, ordinary family life, while Nishi has a very somber family life - his only child has died and his wife suffers from a fatal illness. But the accident reverses this. Horibe loses everything - his family, his job - but Nishi begins to think seriously about the importance of his friends and family. Finally, Nishi and Horibe choose opposite paths: Horibe resolves to live on, while Nishi decides to end his life.

JH: The film is quite self-reflexive in referring to your life, your earlier movies, and your use of violence.

TK: Japanese film critics told me that I put the good parts of all my previous films into one film. But I wanted the violent scenes to be unique.

JH: They are - particularly the scene with the chopsticks. The Japanese title [Hana-Bi], which breaks down the Japanese word for fireworks into the characters fire and flower, seems somewhat philosophical.

TK: I'm embarrassed to admit this, but the original title was Takeshi Kitano, Volume Seven. My staff told me, "Taki-san, you cannot put that name to the film. You have to come up with a proper title." So I let them decide. They had lots of candidates, and Hana-Bi, which the producer came up with, won.

JH: What was your thinking behind the original title? Did you want something completely neutral?

TK: I simply wanted to remind the Japanese audience that I had made six previous films. They weren't aware I had made so many, because all of them flopped.

JH: Why?

TK: The Japanese audience can watch me every night on TV for free. And in Japan, the person regarded most highly is the person who concentrates on one thing. But after I received the Golden Lion in Venice, things changed. Fireworks hasn't opened yet, but it's very anticipated.

JH: Are you surprised that your movies have been more enthusiastically received abroad? Do you ever worry that they might be too Japanese?