The First Great Cut of Hana-bi
The first great cut of Hana-bi (1997, dir. Takeshi Kitano) occurs 10 minutes into the movie. I use “great” here not in assessment of the cut’s quality, but to mark its significance. By cutting from the ignition of a lighter to a paralyzing gunshot, Kitano (who also serves as co-editor of his film) affirms the modus operandi of his film – to rupture the surface beauty of mundane life with unflinching violence. Blink and you’ll miss it. Fire and flower. The immediately obvious effect is that the cut mirrors the violence in the plot. In the first shot, a medium lasting a good ten seconds, Nishi takes a long, measured beat before lighting a cigarette. The flicker of the flame barely registers in the viewer’s brain before Kitano shockingly cuts to an extreme close-up of a bullet departing a gun barrel. This ECU lasts for only less than a second. (Kitano then cuts to a medium long of Horibe writhing in pain, but that’s not the cut in question.) Immediately, we see two major feature...