OxBlog

# Posted 3:55 PM by Ariel David Adesnik

OXBLOG CULT CLASSICS: It is the destiny of certain films to fade gloriously into the star-studded past, admired by masses and critics alike. It is the destiny of other films to become the secret possession of an enlightened few who share their obsessions with their closest friends but are never able to justify it to America's mainstream. A masterful film in that latter category is Jim Jarmusch's Ghost Dog. It is the ultimate embodiment of assassin cool. Forest Whitaker plays the title character, an inner-city ascetic who lives according to the Way of the Samurai. He is a professional killer who handles a gun with the elegance that the Samurai once handled their swords. Whereas Hollywood has glorified the non-chalance of the shotgun-wielding action hero, Jarmusch's Ghost Dog is an intense and meditative individual who recognizes that an instrument of death must must be treated with sacred precision.

The great challenge facing so many martial arts films is how to translate the lexicon of the contact weapon -- sword or fist -- into the language of the bullet-riddled present day. In Way of the Dragon, Bruce Lee granted himself the miraculous ability to disarm polyester gunmen with wooden darts. Other films, such as the Once Upon a Time in China series, have made the wiser decision to cast themselves as period epics in which the world still had a place for pure martial artists. Jarmush transcends this divide by having his protagonist endow a firearm with the philosophical elegance once reserved for the sword and the fist. The result is unforgettable.

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