Sonatine

1993 1h 34m movie Film

Sonatine

“A ferocious man sleeps here.”

Synopsis

“A ferocious man sleeps here.”

Murakawa, a Tokyo yakuza tiring of gangster life, is sent by his boss to Okinawa along with a few of his henchmen to help end a gang war, supposedly to mediate between two warring clans. He finds that the dispute between the clans is insignificant and whilst wondering why he was sent to Okinawa at all, Murakawa’s headquarters are bombed and he and his gang are ambushed.

Audience Engagement

559

Reviews

94th

Review-volume percentile

70th

Popularity percentile

559 audience reviews — more than 94% of Japan films in our index.

Review volume (94th percentile) outruns trending popularity (70th) — a durable title with sustained audience attention.

Titles With Overlapping Themes

Films and series that share thematic tags with Sonatine. Number on each card indicates how many keywords overlap.

Other Titles From Shochiku

Action + Crime in Japan

188 Japan titles in our catalog blend the Action and Crime genres. Below: the top-rated of them (excluding Sonatine itself).

The 1992–1994 Japan Window

Sonatine holds position #25 of 112 Japan films in the 1992–1994 window, below highlighted by audience rating.

The 1990s Japan Landscape

Catalog density by release year across the 1990s in Japan, 447 titles in total. Highlighted year (yellow) is when Sonatine premiered alongside 34 others.

Position in Catalog

Released alongside 34 other Japan films in 1993.

The 918th Japan title from Japan we index (earliest catalogued entry: 1899).

Our Japan catalog contains 4,579 titles in total (2,908 films).

Thematic Fingerprint

Tags on Sonatine, grouped by how common each theme is across the full Asian catalog. Rare tags are more distinctive signals.

Distinctive themes · rare across catalog

gun violence · 4
bullet wound · 3
playfulness · 1

Recurring themes · common across catalog

beach · 19
knife · 9

Mainstream tags · widely used across catalog

japan · 454
yakuza · 93

Reception Benchmarks

7.5

TMDB Rating

559

Audience Reviews

Highly Rated

Critical Tier

Ranked #1,173 of 4,579 Japan films indexed here (74th percentile by TMDB audience score).

Rating is +0.6 points above the Japan average of 6.9/10.

Among Japan Action productions specifically: #518 of 1,714 (top 30%).

Production Details

Primary Country	Japan
Original Language	Japanese
Production Companies	Shochiku, Bandai Visual
Runtime	1h 34m
Release Date	April 10, 1993
IMDb	tt0108188