Ghost Dog lives above the world in a kind of hut he has built on the terrace of an abandoned building. Guided by the words from an ancient book by a master samurai, he is a professional assassin, able to vanish into the night and move about in the city unperceived.

     He lives alone, has no friends, and his only companions are the carrier pigeons he uses to work out details on assignments to be completed.

     When his codes of honor are betrayed by an unbalanced family from the Mafia that at times hire him, he reacts strictly according to the teachings of the samurai: "We are as two ancient tribes that are almost extinct... and all seems to be changing around us."