Yamashita's psyche...

The film certainly toys with this possibility, or even the possibility that he never actually killed his wife but simply 'ran away', too weak to confront the fact that he's a failed husband and lover. I don't think the director wants it to be obvious though. The general tone of the film suggests that he did kill her and has been released 8 years later. If he had simply run away, it would have been more convincing to simply show him being released from prison after an undisclosed amount of time. In any event, I found the film too slow and laboured (I saw the director's cut which is 18 minutes longer) to really bother wanting to watch this again to try to work out whether either theory is correct.

I was kind of thinking that too. I found it curious that his wife's lover is not much mentioned after that scene. Also, the question of who sent that letter never really gets answered.

Later he sees ANOTHER letter in that hallucination, and the handwriting looked very similar to that "sutra" posted on the barber shop door.

I found the odd mood and pacing suggestive of mental illness and unease. Like the graphic sexual situations and violence, and then a switch to an almost slapstick comic climax and a warm-fuzzy romantic comedy denouement.

Of course, I am assuming that it was intentionally done by a skilled filmmaker.

Let's proceed gradually...

1) We cannot make an assumption that he didn't kill his wife at all. It is clear from his surrender and sentence.

2) Letters: A woman's voice was narrating the letters. Why? It can be assumed that he thought of someone who sent (if someone really sent) must be a woman. Also, she mentioned that this is the last time she will warn her. So, why he took actions that day and not before?

3) Sex: The sexual scenes were very passionate/professional. The way it is shown and the expressions of Yamashita suggests that he could never *beep* like that (Or maybe he is sterile.)

4) Prison: His behavior (when he is out) depicts he learned to follow orders in prison. What he underwent (from officers and inmates) is never highlighted.

5) Eel: "He doesn't say what I don't wanna hear!" When Yamashita puts the Eel from the bag to a bucket, he actually talks to him and listens to his reply. This shows his belief in the imagination that the eel listens. Though the real question is why eel? And how finally becoming like an eel made him happy and he let go?
Aristole speculated that Eels were born of "earth worms", which he believed were formed of mud, growing from the "guts of wet soil" rather than through sexual reproduction. Does that eel gives him hope maybe cause he is sterile?

P.S. At last he considers the child as his own and is shown happy. This is the only reason i assumed him to be sterile (or not able to make babies).

Conclusion: The reason for why he murdered his wife is only known to him. 8 years of time is long enough to forget the same. In reality also, things like these can never be completely clear and we assume what we are comfortable with.

When he comes back from fishing early, he finds the white sedan and looks at the street light, for a second, it turns red. This symbolizes the fact that he will see reality from 'rose tinted glasses'. He will see what he wants to. And the letters could be a representation of how doubt grows or they could even be real letters.

So, he was living post-prison life accepting that he loved his wife and he couldn't forgive her. He had no place for another women in his life cause he wasn't willing to confront the truth. Until, it was for Keiko (love) he fought with his drunk-sutra reciting-inmate and confronted what he had to say. He excepted the fact that jealousy of being a lousy lover made him do it, not love. The delusional appearance of that man saying that he hallucinated the letters could be either true or false. But now it doesn't bother him.

i never thought that he had killed 2 people.
if you stab someone it isnt so easy that this one is going to die,
except you hit an important organ.
he stabbed the lover in the back and very high
and then the victim ran away.
i dont think he died.

after that he went straight to the police.
this and the whole picture of the character
said to me that he has done well in prison
so they released him 2 years earlier.

he murdered 1 person
in passion
good behaviour in prison
and a religious guy who is looking after him

dont know how much murderers usually get,
but it sounds believable,
though a lot of people think 10 years is not much