Takumi Saitoh was boosted to stardom by the kind of soft-featured good looks that inspire many a schoolgirl manga, but he has had a more diverse career than the typical ikemen (¡°handsome guy¡°) model-turned-actor. After playing a shy entomologist madly in love with a married woman (Aya Ueto) in the hit ¡°Hirugao¡± TV series and 2017 film, Saitoh segued to a role as a space alien in the low-budget sci-fi splatterfest ¡°Meatball Machine Kodoku.¡± I could go on, but you get the picture.
A film nerd from boyhood, Saitoh has also directed several shorts. Last year his first feature, the enigmatically titled ¡°Blank 13,¡± premiered at the Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival, where it won the competition section¡¯s grand prize. The movie later toured widely on the international festival circuit.
Based on the youth of writer Koji Hashimoto, ¡°Blank 13¡± begins as the latest in the long line of dark Japanese films about absent dads and dysfunctional families. But instead of going down the well-trodden path to florid melodrama, with blows and tears leading the way, the film morphs, midway through its 70-minute running time, into an actors¡¯ workshop, with sharp improvised turns by familiar names, if not ones that often head the credits list. Among the more promient: Jiro Sato, Sairi Ito and Jun Murakami.
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