It does make me feel rather old than Kitano has dropped so much from cultural relevance, he was never exactly a household name in the west outside of the gameshow but was arguably the entomb of cool for a few years either side of the millennium. I spose you could argue it goes rather hand in hand with Japanese pop culture as a whole losing relevance in the west since then with anime not having the pull of the Ghibli/Kon releases or Akira, Ghost in the Shell, etc. You could say I spose part of that isn't just decline(honestly I'v not seen a Beat film since Zatoichi in 2003 so that's hard to know) but that the influence of his work has become so ubiquitous, Ryan Gosling's persona especially for stuff like Drive, Blade Runner and some of the comedy as well I think owes a lot to Takashi and the artier end of Korean cinema also I think owes a good deal to him.