Tadanobu Asano is set to receive r’s Trailblazer Award at the upcoming 37th installment of the Tokyo Film Festival next month. The chameleonic screen actor has been a mainstay of Japanese cinema for nearly three decades while regularly appearing in prominent supporting parts in big Hollywood productions. But his swaggering recent performance as on FX‘s smash-hit series has given him an all-new level of global recognition over the past year.
In the process of becoming an indelible fan favorite, Asano also received his first Emmy nomination for the part. ’s Trailblazer Award, whose recent honorees include six-time Emmy winner Jean Smart, David Oyelowo, Eva Longoria, Matt Bomer, Niecy Nash-Betts and America Ferrera, is given to artists whose work and careers illuminate stories and characters who have been traditionally marginalized in Hollywood. International editor Abid Rahman will present Asano with the award on Oct.
30 at at The Peninsula Hotel in the city’s upscale Ginza district. Stars and dealmakers from across the Japanese film landscape are expected to turn out in force for the gathering. Asano is best known in Japan as a pioneering figure for independent-minded Asian cinema — and that reputation has hardly dimmed since ‘s global success.
He walked the Venice Film Festival’s red carpet earlier this month in support of a lead part in , a well-received satirical yakuza film from Japanese entertainment legend Takeshi Kitano. He’ll in Thai director Pen-ek Ratanaruang‘s culinary thriller , and filmmaker Mark Gill’s , a biographical drama about the life of the great Japanese photographer Masahisa Fukase. A survey of Asano’s filmography features starring roles in projects from many of Japan’s most acclaimed directorial voices of the past 30 years, including Takashi Miike ( ), Kitano ( ), Kiyoshi Kurosawa ( ), Shinya Tsukamoto ( ), Hirokazu Kore-eda ( ), Shunji Iwai ( ), Gakuryu Ishii ( ) and Nagisa Oshima ( ).
On the international front, he has collaborated with top regional auteurs: Thailand’s Pen-Ek ( ), Taiwan’s Hou Hsiao-hsien ( ), Russia’s Sergei Bodrov ( ). On the domestic front, he’s also worked with an expanding list of Hollywood heavyweights, like Martin Scorsese ( ), Roland Emmerich ( ), Johnny Depp ( ), Marvel with its movies (Asano played Hogun), and Warner Bros. with the franchise (as Raiden).
Throughout it all and whatever the part, Asano has remained consistently and beguilingly watchable. The 2024 Tokyo International Film Festival runs Oct. 28-Nov.
6. The event’s full lineup will be unveiled on Sept. 25.
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