![ghost dog ghost dog](https://c8.alamy.com/comp/2CE4M29/halloween-ghost-dog-trick-or-treat-2CE4M29.jpg)
Ghost Dog realizes he must kill Vargo and his men or they will kill him and his master.ĭuring the day, Ghost Dog frequently visits the park to see his best friend, a French-speaking ice cream man named Raymond. They find Ghost Dog's cabin atop a building and kill his pigeons. The mobsters start by tracing all the pigeon coops in town. Louie knows practically nothing about Ghost Dog, as the hitman communicates only by homing pigeon. To avoid being implicated in the murder of a made man, Vargo and his associate Sonny Valerio decide to get rid of Ghost Dog.
![ghost dog ghost dog](https://i2-prod.mirror.co.uk/incoming/article25496672.ece/ALTERNATES/s615b/0_PAY-SPOOKY-FOOTAGE-OF-GHOST-DOG.jpg)
Ghost Dog arrives and kills the gangster, before seeing that the girl is also in the room he leaves her alive. Louie tells Ghost Dog to kill a gangster, Handsome Frank, who is sleeping with the daughter of local mafia boss Vargo.
#Ghost dog code#
While living as a hitman for the American Mafia, he adheres to the code of the samurai, and interprets and applies the wisdom of the Hagakure. The result is weirdly intriguing.Ghost Dog sees himself as a retainer of Louie, a local mobster, who saved Ghost Dog's life years earlier. Jarmusch seems to have directed with his tongue in his cheek, his hand over his heart, and his head in the clouds. If the mobsters are on one level of reality and Ghost Dog on another, then how do we interpret some of the Dog's killings, particularly the one where he shoots a man by sneaking under his house and firing up through the lavatory pipe while the guy is shaving? This is a murder that demands Inspector Clouseau as its investigator. By the end, Whitaker's character has generated true poignance. Ghost Dog, meanwhile, mopes sadly around the neighborhood, solemnly recommending Rashomon to a little girl ("you may want to wait and read it when you're a little older") and miscommunicating with the ice cream man. The gangsters (played by colorful character actors like Henry Silva, Richard Portnow, Cliff Gorman and Victor Argo) sit in their clubhouse doing sub-Scorsese while the Louie character tries to explain to them how he uses an invisible hit man. Jarmusch is mixing styles here almost recklessly and I like the chances he takes. But look more deeply, and you see the self-destructive impulse that guides Ghost Dog in the closing scenes, as he sadly marches forth to practice his code in the face of people who only want to kill him (whether he survives is not the point). The first time I saw it, at Cannes, I thought it was a little too precious, an exercise in ironic style, not substance. I make this argument because I've seen "Ghost Dog" twice, and admired it more after I focused on the hero's insanity. Despite the years he's spent studying The Way of the Samurai, he doesn't even reflect that since his master doesn't subscribe to it, their relationship is meaningless. His profound sadness, which permeates the touching Whitaker performance, comes from his alienation from human society, his loneliness, his attempt to justify inhuman behavior (murder) with a belief system (the samurai code) that has no connection with his life or his world. and then they start talking about the performances and how the director, Jim Jarmusch, is paying homage to Kurosawa and "High Noon." But the man is insane! In a quiet, sweet way, he is totally unhinged and has lost all touch with reality.
#Ghost dog movie#
Are movie critics so hammered by absurd plots that they can't see how truly, profoundly weird "Ghost Dog" is? The reviews treat it matter of factly: Yeah, here's this hit man, he lives like a samurai, he gets his instructions by pigeon, blah. The whole story is so strange, indeed, that I've read some of the other reviews in disbelief. But then it's strange, too, that Ghost Dog lives like a medieval Japanese samurai. It seems strange that a black man would devote his life to doing hired killing for a group of Italian-American gangsters after having met only one of them. When the mob bosses want Ghost Dog rubbed out, they're startled to discover that Louie doesn't know his name or where he lives their only contact is the pigeons. Ghost Dog insists on being paid once a year, on the first day of autumn. He orders hits by sending Ghost Dog messages by carrier pigeon. The mobster is named Louie ( John Tormey). He got into this business because one day a mobster saved his life-and so, since he follows The Way of the Samurai, he must dedicate his life to his master. What's your diagnosis? Ghost Dog ( Forest Whitaker) is a killer for the mob. The Haitian speaks no English and Ghost Dog speaks no French, so they simply speak in their own languages and are satisfied with that. Actually, he does talk: to the little girl and to a Haitian ice cream man. "He has no friends and never talks to anybody," according to the mother of the little girl in the movie. He lives in a shack on a rooftop with his pigeons. It helps to understand that the hero of "Ghost Dog: The Way of the Samurai" is crazy.