I need your help folks, but who was the guy who killed Hachi in his hut?
Didn't I pay right attention? In my translated german version this guy said something to Hachi that I didn't understand because it was so awfully synchronised. What did he say and who was he?
Hachi was killed by the guy who the old women and her daughter would take all the Samurai weapons and armour to. I'm not sure why he killed him though. I'm guessing it has something to do with the demonic mask.
shareThank you for the answer Oldboy
shareHmmm...I thought he was killed by the old woman's son who came back after everyone thought he was dead. The mystery man had a much darker complexion than the guy they sold all their samurai armor and stuff to. And why would he want to kill Hachi anyway? Apologies if I'm way off base.
share I thought it was one of those samurais who wandered occasionally through the field. He found an empty hut, saw some food...
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It was a random samurai wandering around.
Laugh, and the world laughs with you. Weep, and you weep alone.
Yeah, having just watched it again, I'm sure it's just some random guy who ended up in his hut.
shareyep,random guy.
shareThat could have been pretty confusing.
Please can you put spoiler warnings in your subject title in future.
I think this guy must be son of old woman ..
a random guy ruins story integrity.
think it was left open so you would never know, could've been
-a random guy or
-the woman's son; which would explain the look on hachi's face
ie like ive been caught out. Maybe say he left him for dead in the war.
Don't know why the film studies teacher would've said it was the woman, unless the mask made her get that guy to do it ?
Who knows !
I thought it was the samurai that the old lady stole the mask from, he had the same (disease?) marks on his face.
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Yeah, that's what I thought too, because of the face. It doesn't really make sense though.. how would he have got out of the hole even if he lived, and why would he want to kill Hachi?
Some velvet morning when I'm straight...
I also thought that the samurai was her son who killed Hachi at the end.
shareThe story's integrity isn't ruined by Hachi being killed by a wandering samurai - in fact, it's poetic justice. Hachi learns to survive off of killing samurai for their weapons and armor, therefore implying that their small territory has a knack for attracting a good deal of these sort of men. These men would be just like Hachi was in the beginning, hungry and desperate.
Hachi enters the hut but doesn't behave like a normal peasant - he doesn't cower or show respect to his guest. Instead, Hachi, while probably being shocked at the intrusion, demands the man's purpose and displays vulgar pride which would have been insulting and confrontational. Of course the samurai kills Hachi - it makes perfect sense.
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Please can you put spoiler warnings in your subject title in future.This topic is called "Who killed Hachi?". If you don't want to find out, don't read the posts. share
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The issue is not that reading the posts reveals who killed Hachi, it's that simply reading the subject line reveals that Hachi gets killed.
Merely asking the question spoils the surprise of Hachi's demise.
I agree with many of the respondents. The murderer was some random guy. From the way he was dressed, he was a lower-level samurai (modern equivalent of enlisted man). He just happened to burglarize Hachi's hut because he was starving. Of course, he could have been the old woman's son. However, there is absolutely no mention of this man being the old woman's son anywhere in the movie.
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Having just watched it I agree I think it's some random samurai. At the start of the film when Hatchi returns he talks about stealing food from peasants when he was fighting the war. I can't remember ifn he said anything about killing peasants to steal food, but if he didn't I'm sure it could be implied. That way his death is kind of ironic that now is is about to have a wife and settle down as a farmer he gets killed in a way he used to kill people. Annoying I have just sent the DVD back to Lovefilm so can't listen to the commentary to confirm who the guy was.
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Do you have a version with the directors commentary though. Straight after watching the film I watched the last couple of minutes with commentary because I couldn't work out whether the old woman made the jump or not. Listening to the commentary told me this was the whole point of the ending. I should have listened to the whole commentary and would then probaably have a definite answer but I was in too much of a rush to get the Sunday post. I think I will have to buy the film anyway....
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I think the guy who kills Hachi is just another Fleeing Samurai who happens upon Hachi's Hut and promptly starts eating his food (which is what is on his face). Frightened upon his detection, the Samurai kills Hachi and runs off.
It certainly was the guy who buys the armour off the mother, he looked totally different. It wasn't the samurai with the mask as he was dead at the bottom of the hole and his face was severly scarred.
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To me it was another part of the curse of the mask. He was killed by a random guy (possibly a ghost), but the murder was part of the mask's curse. Hachi's death is just one more thing the old woman has to live with and feel guilty about for the rest of her life. It sounds sinister and dark I know, but so is the whole moral of the story. I love this film.
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Guys, don't you think in a movie with everything so perfectly placed, every character put in after a significantly brillinat thought process, a random guy surely doesn't fit in.
I have this strange feeling, its almost stupid, but i'll still go ahead: the susuki grass, great shots of field swaying with air, some times especially in context of the movie, for e.g whenever the daughter-in-law ran away to ingratiate herself, grass moved a little bit slowly, while at the starting, where the movie is violent to begin with, it sways more rapidly, i just had the feeling that someone was keeping a constant vigil on the old woman and two lovers. It could've been her son, may be someone else. But what if her son was watching them all the time. And kills Hachi in the end?
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I was reading through and wanting to make just that point. For me the killer is clearly connected to the mask and the older woman, he some kind of manifestation of her power and desire. The timing of the murder and way we witness it (intercut with the women's scene) implies a connection, but no other explanation rings true anyway. I'm not convinced by the random hungry man either, as others have said it's too... well, random. Also he just runs off after killing Hachi, surely if he were starving he would have taken food. And no way was it the son/husband, that just doesn't fit. The mask is obviously very important, I'm convinced the killer was some peasant acting under the influence of the mask/demon.
shareI think it was the son, in the film there are no marks about that the mask has a demonic power, the only think that we know is this mask terrorizes the people and it's hard to pull off when you have wear it. When the mother can't keep off she explains that is for the rain. This explanaition take away the theory that have some magic power.
At the first time that we know Hachi he don't says ,that her soldier mate, the husband of the woman that he would seduce, is dead, he says this the second time he found the two female, that it is in my opinion a great clue to understand that her mate wasn't really killed, he only says that HE ESCAPE.
And in the murder of Hachi, the camera angle is planted in the reaction of the face of Hachi after the view of the person who was eating her food, and there's a lot of knowing in their gazes, that means that was her mate, that finally can scape and view that her friend was *beep* with her woman because Hachi lie about her dead.
And in the final scene, I am comletely sure that the mother dead, dead with the tramp that she built saying that is not a monster for her excessive control of the husband son.
This is my theory
Really I find it quite simple. If it were the son he would have returned to HIS house not his friends. Also, I think you all are looking too deeply into this part.
Perhaps it is meant to SHOW that Hachi isn't on the up and up, as we are led to believe perhaps he has been lying. So he gets his comeupins..but it IS from just a hungry wandereing samurai. If you have to read anything into it, perhaps we can say that the old hag paid someone to kill him. And said you can take what you like from his hut, IE the food.
I don't feel it is imporant how he died but rather that he did. Payback for lying perhaps and taking advantage of his friends widow.
Also..the man who killed Hachi is way older than him, so further explaing that it isn't girls husband/son/friend. Just random dude.
People keep saying it doesn't fit the story, but of course it DOES. The whole story has random wanderers going through those fields.
Not everything needs to be anylized.
It was just a random guy in the hut. I think the significance of this lies within the fact that it was a random guy in the hut. Hachi is killed in much the same way that the ladies kill other samurai. One of the many reasons that Hachi is killed by the random guy is because it is a reflection of the randomness, violence, and senselessness of the world around them.
shareThere's a commentary track by the director on one of the (I think) PAL dvd's. I have the Criterion which doesn't have commentary; perhaps it's revealed on the PAL dvd?? Anyway, I thought it was the girl's husband. But if the director doesn't say anything then we'll likely never know.
shareThe son Killed Hashi, he returned to take revenge because he was left in the battlefield to die.
shareThere actually isn't a single shred of evidence in the movie to support this conclusion. Just your desire for it to be so.
The fact that we get to learn so much about the mother and the daughter-in-law, and not a single thing about the man who kills Hachi, would actually support the notion that he was merely some random samurai, not the son/husband.
I think he is a random guy searching for food. And he killed Hachi in fear of loosing food.
In those fields right from the beginning, whenever someone is 'starving' has to accept the truth that for living one has to kill.
So all of them one by one started killing for survival even Hachi chose to kill those samurai unconsciously without being told by Old woman or her daughter in-law. So I think it's the payback for Hachi for what he has done.
He can't be son since he's looking much older.
I like the idea of it being the womans son - but it soooo isn't!
Like other posters have said, I think people are looking into it too much - its just some other peasant killing and looking for food like the women - there's nothing to suggest that it has anything to do with the mask - I like that not a lot is made of his death in the film - like the kid says in Magnolia, "this is just something that happens" . . .
I agree with the random samurai theory.
And its not out of place for it to be a random person in such a well thought out movie because he fits in with all the characters too. He is a thief and a murderer just like the lot of them. His story would probably be another movie.
I always took Hachi's reaction not meaning he recognizes the guy but that he knows this man is going to stab him for his possessions.
I,too, agree with him being random. The point is how the women and Hachi have been killing for food and survival. It's appropriate, therefore, that the old woman winds up in the hole, and Hachi gets stabbed by another hungry scavenger. Also, both of them exploited and used the younger girl, to some extent. And, who knows? She may have then run to Hachi's hut and been confronted by his killer, as well. They may ALL die. And it would be hard to have much sympathy for them , as well.
shareIn the Japan of the time it was very common for peasants to gang up on, kill, and strip the armor from samurai who were on the losing side and fleeing. The samurai were, of course, very aware of this and the aftermath of any battle was a life and death struggle of the samurai to escape. At many points in Japanese history these battles were continuous and the film starts with just such a scene. That is a clear indication that there had recently been a nearby battle and other samurai could be expected to be around who were in the process of evasion and escape.
shareJust watched this fascinating film last night. In answer to the question, consider that there was a battle shortly before. Remember the women watching the smoke rising across the river? I think it is entirely in keeping with the randomness of a starving samurai (stranger) happening upon Hachi's hut and dispatching him in much the same way as the old woman and her daughter-in-law killed the two samurai at the beginning of the movie.
Also, each time someone seems to feel safe, they find out they aren't. The first two samurai, the two battling and swimming across the river, one of whom is calling for help and thinks he finds it as Hachi reaches out his pole, and the mask-wearing samurai who thinks he has found a way out of the interminable grass and closer to home all believe they have found safety in the company of the women. Within the grass, the hut is a place of safety, a belief disputed by the demon samurai's sword that threatens the old woman, so when Hachi arrives back to his hut, feeling satisfied, if not satiated, his safety is also an illusion.
Anyway, these are my thoughts on the question. Hope it helps. This is a truly mesmerizing film.
It's a random guy. He wasn't one of the guys buying the armour and weapons from the women. The guy stealing Hachi's food was a scavenger . Why would the weapons dealers need to steal Hachi's millet? It definately wasn't the old woman or her son. The old woman was in her hut when it happened and why would the son (if he were alive) go to Hachi's hut for food before he went to his own mother's hut?
Sorry to all those who like things to fit so nicely together but you're wrong. Few things ever fit nicely in Japanese films anyway. It's a random guy; probably from the battle where the women saw the smoke rising from.
okay, so this's my retake on this:
my perception is if you observe carefully, as barely pointed out by an another poster, and by the old woman (Nabuki Otawa) the mysterious core theme of the movie is the 'sin' and the probable 'sinners'. The old woman had to pay for ditching an unassuming, seemingly harmless guy into a hole by a scarred face and a probable death. It's possible that, since Hachi probably lied to the old woman and her daughter in law about her husband being dead in the war, and flinged with her, is what might've caused his death, likely by her son who returned (remember the polka dotted face of the 'random guy' and when Hachi said they were beaten with sticks all over, plus it's a war going on. also, the look on Hachi's face resembled more of someone in astonishment rather than intrigued.)The daughter in law, having sinned, would now have to deal with loneliness as a result. I'm not saying that the thought that a random guy kiled Hachi doesn't fit in with the story, but the fact that every thing seems to fit in place and more 'appropriate' when we look at it this way. I mean, what does smoke coming up from far away has to do everything with a random guy in the hut? Why not in a movie so deep it can't be the son who returned from war and balanced the situation from a karma perspective? It's just a thought.
Nah, I definitely think it was a random. It ties into the whole anti-war themes of the movie.
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I wish there was a definitive answer for either of those questions. I don't mean to sound like an ass, but that's the whole point of this thread. Who was that guy? I would like to think it's the son come back to take his revenge, but there's no way to be sure. With a movie like this, a director leaves questions open-ended because they want people to think. Maybe the director has a set idea in mind as to what the ending truly is, but wants to leave it open for people to interpret, meaning there is no "right answer." While this concept drives me INSANE as I always want an explanation, like when I saw Eraserhead for the first time, this is one of those movies that I just have to appreciate and love for what it is. I've seen a ton of answers on this board, each as possible as the next, and still I don't have a definitive answer, but I guess that's it. Such is film.
sharei think it was just a random thief. i think it just represents Hachi's karma comming back to him.
shareYeah, I think it's fitting that it's just some random guy who kills him to continue eating Hachi's rice, since the trio killed random samurai to eat themselves.
shareI think it has to be a random guy because he was a dwarf. If you look it carefully you can see his arms are very short, so his legs must be very short, and it's not likely that the son-husband was a dwarf. I think this clinches it.
shareI agree with the random samurai. But i do think it has a deeper meaning. He kills Hachi, and then at the very end, the old lady jump is edited in a way that it repeats itself, meaning (for me at least) that the new guy (the one who killed Hachi) will kind of take hes place with the young lady and the story will repeat in the same way. Like a curse.
shareIn wikipedia the plot says the same random samurai.....was stealing food...
shareTo be honest I first thought it was the samurai the old woman killed.
But I can't be sure.
If it had been the son there would have to be some mention of it so my guess is either some random dude or the samurai/demon.
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I'd go with the returning son or a random guy. But I recall there being 2 other people with Ushi, the guy who buys the samurai stuff. Could be one of them.
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