As a result of this book, I want to invite more conversations on cinema. These days, I have been very concerned about a sense of exclusivism in the name of diversity. Equity, diversity, and inclusion should be the top priority in society. There is no doubt about that. They are a basic human right. However, are we sometimes becoming too defensive to avoid being offensive? Is it becoming difficult to critique others' thoughts? I think there is a clear difference between critiquing and criticizing. An individual perspective should not be considered untouchable, but it is meant to engage in debate or exchanges of ideas. It may be comfortable to hide from the outside world and stay in an octopus pot (tako-tsubo), in the Japanese idiom. When there is self and other, there may be conflict because they are different. If we look at the current condition of the humanities, I wonder if we are willing to face the conflict. Being cloistered, we are turning a blind eye to the conflict. If that is the case, the conflict will never go away. This is the sense of exclusivism I am talking about. I am not suggesting that a quarrel is necessary to face the conflict. But Mikhail Bakhtin stressed that dialogue would reveal multiple perspectives and voices. Each person has their final word, but it should interact with other people. I see fundamental ethics in such dialogue.

What Le Samouraï shows us is the significance of getting out of the octopus pot. Costello's story ends tragically, but it also gives us new hope. For the first time in his professional life as a lone killer, he loses control of his feelings and emotions when he is witnessed by Valérie (Caty Rosier), a black singer/pianist of the club whose owner he has just assassinated. He encounters her face to face. Let me quote sentences from Chapter 5:

After a lineup of suspects, including Costello, Valérie asserts in front of the Chief Inspector (François Perier) that she has never seen Costello. Her testimony should let Costello regain his confidence. However, a strange shot-reverse-shot editing appears in this scene. Costello (and the Chief Inspector) and Valérie look directly at the camera.

The acclaimed Japanese filmmaker Yasujiro Ozu regularly uses this type of shot-reverse-shot in conversation scenes. The characters appear to speak directly to the viewers of the film. At the same time, the POV becomes reciprocal. Costello and Valérie are simultaneously subjects and objects of their gazes. As a result, numerous questions arise. Who is looking at whom? From whose perspective is the film narrated at this point? Whatever the reason behind Valérie's lie, Costello does not lose to the police for now. But doesn't he lose to Valérie? This strange shot-reverse-shot editing combines high-angle and low-angle shots. Because Costello is standing and Valérie is sitting, he appears to (or wants to) stand on the higher ground. Costello is looking down at Valérie, only slightly, though. The following scenes are narrated from Costello's viewpoint because the camera follows his actions (pp. 51-53).

Such a face-to-face encounter leads to the thoughts of the French philosopher Emmanuel Levinas and his ethics. According to Levinas, the “face-to-face encounter with the other” who is suffering in pain makes an individual aware of the other's mortality. The individual cannot help but hesitate, facing such vulnerability in the other. As I discuss in another new book of mine, Ozu and the Ethics of Indeterminacy (2026), in the end, such an encounter demands an ethical response to the other. The hesitation is not to make a hasty judgment of the other. Not to be authoritative over the other. This is the tiny but certain hope that we feel after watching Le Samouraï. My hope is that this book is valuable not only to those readers already invested in Melville or film studies but to all readers in the humanities. The humanities are the fundamental study of all aspects of human society and culture.