Cynics would say that Kitano knows an audience will endure long minutes of artistic entropy as long as he delivers a few shootouts or explosions. The artillery scenes are like production numbers in old musicals. But he doesn't cue the killings or glamorize them. Things just erupt, blow up, like in real life. Like, his admirers would say, in real art.
Fireworks also flirts with humanism.
He's Nishi, a cop, and his wife has terminal cancer. But tenderness hasn't softened him. A creep shakes him down, and he pokes a chopstick in the guy's eye. Stick a gun in his face he has no reaction. Go ahead and shoot, his look says.