Jim Jarmusch could be the poster boy for independent filmmakers. Consistently working outside the studio system, he has made small, quirky pictures that find limited but devoted audiences. His most popular film, Down by Law, introduced Roberto Benigni to American audiences, and his last major work, Dead Man (starring Johnny Depp), delighted critics with its dead-pan take on the Western but left many filmgoers bewildered.

So it's no surprise that his latest film, Ghost Dog The Way of the Samurai, is another unusual picture. But this one, which combines the dry humor of Down by Law with the genre-bending of Dead Man, should find a larger audience.

The movie is about Ghost Dog, a self-named hit  man who mixes the ancient code of the samurai with the up-to-date technology of electronic surveillance and high-powered rifles. Played by Forest Whitaker (Crying Game), Ghost Dog lives in a shack on the top of an apartment building where he raises carrier pigeons and reads old samurai texts. Periodically, he receives a message, conveyed by his pigeons from a low-level gangster, for a job which he then methodically handles.

Unfortunately, his careful preparation fails him when he's hired to kill a man who's sleeping with the mob boss's daughter, Louise. While Ghost Dog succeeds in making the hit, Louise notices him, which causes the mob boss

(played by Henry Silva, Sharky's Machine) to turn on him. But Ghost Dog, trained in the samurai code, can't bring himself to return the favor, so he spends much of the movie avoiding the mob. It's only when his beloved pigeons are killed that he seeks retribution.

Unlike most gun movies, this film has a slow, brooding pace that matches that of its main character. Opening with a shot of a bird flying languidly through the twilight sky, the movie only rarely alters its course. Even the shoot-out scenes, of which there are more than a few, feel like they were shot on Prozac.

Jarmusch is clearly toying with the gangster genre. By casting a black man as the central figure, he highlights the unspoken racial dynamics in most mob movies. This comes to the fore in a hilarious early scene when Louie

(John Tormey in a great performance), Ghost Dog's link to the mob, explains who Ghost Dog is. The bosses, upset that they've unknowingly hired a black man, start to denigrate his nickname. This leads to a discussion of rapper and Native American names that is stunningly funny and then becomes even more pointed when those are linked with the gangsters' own monikers.

By conflating the Western, samurai and gangster genres, Jarmusch cleverly highlights the assumptions of each. Furthermore, Jarmusch tweaks each genre by putting its conventions in unusual lights. In a great scene later in the movie, the mob is exposed as being three months behind in its rent, which leads to a fabulous confrontation with their landlord. At the end of the film, there's a shoot-out near a park that could be taken out of any Western, except that here the scene's on a deserted street in the middle of a city. And throughout the picture, Forest Whitaker reads from The Way of the Samurai, but the "wisdom" is so oblique or trite it reveals the cliché. "It is bad when one thing becomes two," goes one saying, and I still don't know what that means.

The movie is more than just an exploration of genre, however. The theme of communication comes to the fore when we meet Ghost Dog's best friend, Raymond (Isaach de Bankole, Night on Earth), who only speaks French. Their conversations, which neither of them understands, are humorously repetitious. When a young girl (Camille Winbush) enters the scene, she's as mystified as we are. Her relationship with Ghost Dog is one of the more interesting in the film, as they talk about  books--Rashomon, Frankenstein and W.E.B. DuBois--and friendship. As we notice the difference in their ages, we wonder how Ghost Dog became who he is and what will happen as the girl grows up.

While the film is shot in color, it reminded me a great deal of Jarmusch's earlier movie Down by Law. Both films were photographed by Robby Muller (who also did Breaking the Waves), and they capture the luminescence of the city at night in ways that few movies do. The plentiful use of dissolves also fits with the movie's leisurely pace.

The best part of the movie, though, might be the soundtrack by THE RZA, the founder of the Wu-Tang Clan. His expressive score, alternately sparse and then powerful, is a perfect accompaniment to what's on screen.

The film isn't perfect, however. The acting, in particular, is often flat. Forest Whitaker, usually a strong presence in whatever he does, here plays a stoic character without much energy. The mobsters are often just foils for a fantastic script, never fleshing out who they are. Only John Tormey rises above to give us a compelling portrait.

That aside, Ghost Dog is a fantastic movie. Thought-provoking and genuinely funny, it's a good reminder of why independent films are an important thread in the fabric of American movies. 

J. Robert Parks 3/14/2000