[PIFF] Japanese actor Tsumabuki Satoshi visits PIFF

Tsumabuki Satoshi attends a press meeting for his film "Villain" held at The Westin Chosun hotel in Busan, South Korea on October 11, 2010. [Chae Ki-won/10Asia]

To think such a face would be seen on Tsumabuki Satoshi. To think that such anger and loneliness could be seen from he who used to smile ever so brightly or burst into tears like a child. Tsumabuki Satoshi put on a never-before-seen face in his film "Villain" with which he visited the 15th Pusan International Film Festival (PIFF). The film, based on a novel of the same name by Yoshida Shuichi and helmed by director Lee Sang-il of "Hula Girls," concentrates on the minute trembling Tsumabuki shows, as if to show that everything Lee wants to say is contained within his face. And during the two seconds the muscles on his face twists with anger, the audience immediately figures out who Yuichi is. Yuichi, who Tsumabuki explained "was the role I opted for first [before I was handed it]" is the "complete opposite from my actual cheerful personality." Raised by his grandparents because his parents abandoned him, Yuichi buys a girl with money he made through hard labor. The only way Yuichi, who has never formed a proper relationship, runs away from his loneliness was by continuously building the wall around him higher and higher. And it is both horrifying and painfully heartbreaking to see how he continues to stubbornly build the wall that fails to protect him.

But the Tsumabuki who turned up at a joint interview on Monday was still the heartthrob. Could it be because like he said, he "is happy to still be called a pretty boy and will keep trying to be called that"? The careful footsteps he took and the eyes he lowered as he waited for his turn to respond to a question, was pretty enough to draw exclamation from the viewer. And when reminded of how he casually went to the bathroom during an open talk session at last year's PIFF, the way he laughed and embarrassedly scratched his head made him look so young that it was difficult to believe he was 31 years old. Yet when it comes to acting he is thorough to the extent he "grills and questions" himself and an actor matured enough to reveal his ambition to "try being an director like Oguri Shun if given the chance." "Villain" worries about how the world these days is void of "the person who is so precious to me that I become happy just imaging that he feels happy." Well, as long as Tsumabuki exists, there will be at least one person who can make that happen.

Reporter : Lee Ji-Hye seven@
Photographer : Chae ki-won ten@
Editor : Jessica Kim jesskim@