Handsome Abe Kanta is upset about “not trimming his eyebrows and getting his hair dirty.” He hides his halo and makes a wish, and his fate with Taiwan continues

Japan Director Bunji Toyama directed the film “Happy Post-It” starring Hiroshi Abe. Hiroshi Abe changed his usual tough and charming image this time to play the role of Taro Igawa, a man who has been isolated from the world for 40 years. He has to shed his star halo and portray an ordinary person who wishes to reconnect with the world. He admitted that this time the most difficult task was not to do complex tasks, but to do simple tasks. “Doing simple things is the hardest thing to do.”

Abe Hiroshi talked about his feelings about visiting Taiwan again after two years. He said that he has been here many times before and is very familiar with Taiwan. He especially liked the ancient buildings of Dihua Street. This promotional trip was also specially organized to visit various places in Taiwan. Even though it was work, it still felt like a vacation. The thing that impressed him most was Dihua Street. He felt that the road was full of ancient atmosphere. He and director Bunji Toyama also visited the City God Temple to pay tribute and buy souvenirs.

Weishan Wenjie revealed that whenever he comes to Taiwan, he will definitely buy ancient-style peanut cakes. He thinks they are very tasty. He always buys a lot of them and takes them back to Japan and distributes them to his colleagues and film crew members. This time is no exception, and he specially buys them on Dihua Street.

Talking about this role, Abe Hiroshi frankly said that Taro Aikawa’s performance was very difficult. He spent a lot of time studying his way of speaking. He also watched other films to think about how to present the character’s tone and situation. Originally, he wanted to make the performance more complex, but later found that the character needed to be restrained rather than revealed. The director also kept reminding him: “You can be more normal.” But this is the hardest part.

He laughingly said that most of the roles he has played in recent years have been quite strong, either in both civilian and military roles, or in intelligence and courage. Once he enters the performance situation, it is easy to become too strong without realizing it, so this time he has to give up his previous acting habits little by little. Apart from acting skills, styling is also important. The crew had to finalize the costume three times before ultimately finding a look that suited Igawa Taro.

In order to make the audience believe that this handsome man is an ordinary person, Abe Hiroshi also adopted some tricks in life, including deliberately not plucking his eyebrows and messing up his hair to reduce his sense of existence as much as possible. He laughed and said that these are actually tricks he usually uses when he doesn’t want to be discovered by others, and he used them on character this time too. What made him most happy was that the agent of the bar owner actor in the drama came to the filming scene. Only after filming for a long time did he suddenly realize that he too was present there. This made him feel quite accomplished and he said: “It’s great! It means I’ve successfully become a different person.”

Totoyama Bungei stated that the film did not deliberately craft the plot to match Abe Hiroshi’s star image, but instead took Igawa Taro’s character as a starting point. What Tarot wants to do is actually very simple, nothing more than working, meeting someone, or helping others. But for a man who has been isolated from the world for 40 years, these seemingly normal desires are hard to realize. The director hopes that through trying every little thing in life, he will show how each experience of success or failure can become a strength to live by and take him to the next phase of his life.

There is also a scene in the film where Hiroshi Abe learns to swim. In real life he is very good at swimming. He admitted that at first he could not understand the feelings of people who could not swim. Therefore, he recalled his feelings when he was learning to swim as a child. He hoped to show the natural fear of water experienced by beginners rather than deliberately demonstrating it. Bunji Toyama revealed that there was only one chance to shoot the seaside scene because the costumes could not get wet and they could not wait for the clothes to dry after filming, so he hoped that Hiroshi Abe would complete it in one go. The plot deliberately arranges such that Taro can drown in shallow water, giving the audience the sense that his fear does not just come from the depth of the water, but that there may be an unknown past hidden behind it.

The director also mentioned that the image of Taro drowning in water was more difficult to shoot, compared to the seaside scene. The crew repeatedly tested different methods of submersion, because in the actual performance, the body could easily turn feet first, making it difficult to achieve the beautiful pose of sinking back into the water earlier in the film. Abe Hiroshi was also very dedicated. Although he was not suitable for repeated filming due to physical reasons, he still wanted to make the picture as good as possible. Ultimately, the scene was completed after many discussions and tests by the team.

Talking about his future wish list, Hiroshi Abe revealed that bringing his work to the Golden Horse Film Festival this time has ignited the idea of ​​collaborating with foreign film teams once again. He once collaborated with Taiwanese director Lin Shuyu in “The Garden of Evening Mist”. At that time he had gone to Malaysia for shooting. The crew used up to 9 languages ​​to communicate. Although they did not understand each other’s languages, they had a common language because of film and production. This experience inspired him greatly, and he also looks forward to the opportunity to collaborate with filmmakers from different countries in the future. He also expressed a wish: “I hope I can have an unbreakable bond with Taiwan.”