Tan Jianci is a dancer by training. The only scene that required him to dance in Lost, Indulgence posed a challenge: He had to move so badly that no trace of his grace and dexterity remained.
Lost, Indulgence is the 18-year-old's only film. He was 17 when it was shot last year in the hilly city of Chongqing. The scene involves him dancing to the music his father was listening to while his taxi rolled into a river.
It was set up to be the teenage son's expression of sadness at his dad's death and his frustration at being unable to track down the real cause of the accident, accentuated by the possible motive of showing off to a woman he has a growing affection for.
Tan complained about the slow tempo of the song, which was playing in the background. Once it was switched to a dance mix, Tan got the feeling and nailed the scene.
This is just one of several showy scenes in Lost, Indulgence, which opened nationwide on Nov 14. Although Tan has the meatiest role in the movie, there is a glittering cast: Jiang Wenli plays his hard-working mom; Eric Tsang has a cameo as his taxi-driver father; Eason Chan is the Hong Kong businessman who gets into a strange friendship with the mom, and Karen Mok is the mysterious woman who turns the family upside down.
"It was a learning experience," says Tan, whose character Xiao Chuan is caught in a vortex of conflicting emotions.
Tan was impressed with Jiang's attention to small details that she improvised during scenes.
"She would do something with her hair while talking to me, which added naturalness to a simple conversation between mother and son," Tan says.
