The sunkissed, languorous streets of Japan, melting and pouring up the heatwave veil, are leading Azuma (Takeshi Kitano), the policeman, straight to the scene of bloody slaughter, accompanied by the sound of bones breaking. Such contradictions are almost unexplainable, and coherent in this movie, at the same time creating the feeling of true horror, the calm before the storm and the sense that everything is normal. That's life.
Takeshi's character is suited for everything. He is able to endure the pain and the smell of blood. He is able to endure betrayal, to fight, to watch his loved ones fall down. A bulletproof man, undestroyable. Nevertheless, he can hold a grudge, and every person trying to cross him in the wrong time and place, should be aware of him. That kind of character will appear in Kitano's later works and would be his signature, the most recognisable and charismatic one: an absolutely cold badass.
In Violent Cop, it is possible to see the kind of Japan that you want to avoid: slummy, brutal, rotting; godforsaken, left in the dust. Sometimes people say that if you lack character and strength of mind then you shouldn't stick your nose where it doesn't belong. However, the duty of the police is to invade the forbidden, dirty parts of both the city and the human soul, that sometimes lead to a point of no return in an officer's inner self. "I intentionally shoot violence to make the audience feel real pain. I have never and I will never shoot violence as if it's some kind of action video game," said Takeshi Kitano.