SYNOPSISAfter a job goes terribly wrong, wounded hitman Mr Long is stranded in a remote

Japanese town. He unexpectedly receives help from a little boy named Jun, and their

touching bond is sealed thanks to Mr Long‘s homemade noodle soup. Before long,

all the neighbors have fallen for his culinary talents. His new friends build a makeshift

food cart and Mr Long sets up a thriving noodle soup business in front of the local

temple. As part of his new life, Mr Long helps Jun‘s single mother overcome her

problems. Maybe even a coldhearted killer can find happiness in an unlikely place.

SABU„Mr Long“ is SABU‘s second film in Competition at the

Berlin Film Festival, after “Chasuke‘s Journey” in 2015.

Born in 1964 in Wakayama Prefecture in Japan. As

an actor, he received his first lead role in “World

Apartment Horror” (1991) by Katsuhiro Ohtomo,

for which he won a Best Newcomer Award at the

13th Yokohama Film Festival. Began penning his own

screenplays from 1995, and made his directorial debut

in the following year with “D.A.N.G.A.N. Runner” (aka

“Non-Stop”, 1996), which was selected in the Berlin

Fest‘s Panorama. His second film “Postman Blues”

(1997) was acclaimed at Sundance, and also received

a New Blood Award at the Cognac Police Film Festival.

With “Unlucky Monkey” (1997) and “Monday” (1999),

he achieved the feat of having both works selected by

Berlin‘s Forum, and also won a FIPRESCI Prize for

the latter. Subsequently “Drive” (2001) won the Best

Asian Film at Fant-Asia Film Festival in Canada,

“The Blessing Bell” (2002), won the NETPAC Award

at Berlin‘s Forum. “Dead Run” (2005) was selected

by the Panorama, “Kanikosen” (2009), was selected

by the Forum, and “Bunny Drop” (2011), a box-office

success in Japan, all expanded his range while also

achieving critical recognition. To date, retrospectives

of his work have been held in Chicago, as well as in

Hungary, Serbia and Montenegro, Hong Kong and

others. His previous film, “Miss Zombie” (2013) won the

Best Film at Geradmer and Fantasporto Film Festival.

INTERVIEW WITH SABU

ORIGIN OF THE PROJECTWhen I visited Taiwan in 2015 to promote Chasuke’s Journey, I met actor Chang Chen who said he was interested in acting in one of my films. I immediately started thinking about a story in which he could play the main role. Several months later, I finished the first draft of the script, and offered it to him. Chang Chen‘s charm was an important inspiration for this movie.

JAPANESE & MANDARINFor the first time, I had to direct actors speaking both Japanese and Mandarin. As for the actors‘ movements, sometimes I wondered if my instruction was precisely translated or not. For the expression of feelings, however, I had no problem in directing because it was obvious that they fully understood my intention when I watched their performances.

MR LONG‘S NOODLE SOUPAs Long is thrown into a foreign environment, cooking becomes a form of communication for him. The beef noodle soup that Long cooks is different from the soup that he has eaten before. It can‘t be perfectly identical, because some Taiwanese seasonings cannot be found in Japan. He is forced to adapt and use substitutions. Nevertheless, for the towns-people, his soup is real: genuine Taiwanese beef noodle soup.

Different cultures generate different personalities, different points of view, different manners and even different food preferences. But there could always be something in common, even something as simple as beef noodle soup.

If someone finds himself in a different culture, something harmonious can be expe-rienced. We can feel nostalgic in a landscape which we never saw before. It‘s possible for us to sympathize with the story of people who live in a different country. Relating with others does not always have to generate anxiety or fear. In MR LONG, there‘s a moment where Long, Jun and Lily are walking together, carefree and happy, free of any anxiety.

RUNYIN BAI AS LITTLE JUNThe Taiwanese casting director recommended several child actors and I decided to cast Runyin Bai immediately after I met him. He was born with a Taiwanese father and Japa-nese mother. Since he lives in Taiwan, his main language is Mandarin, but he can also speak Japanese. He has already acted in a few films, but I didn‘t have the opportunity to see them.

LILY & KENJIEven with people I simply walk past, I sometimes think about what life that person has lived up until now. This is how the idea came into my mind for the flashback story of Lily and Kenji. I met actress Yiti Yao in the auditions in Taiwan. She laughs a lot, and there is no deception in her smile. Although she is slender, her firm standing pose is strong and beautiful. That’s the reason I cast her as Lily. As for Sho Aoyagi, I cast him because I felt his sincerity and purity when I met him, which was perfect for the role of Kenji.

THE TOWNSPEOPLEMr Long‘s new friends serve as a sort of Greek chorus in the film. Since their presence maintains a certain emotional level consistently, the change and wavering of Mr Long, Lily and Jun can be shown vividly. For the roles of the townspeople, I looked for actors who are not necessarily well-known, but who can act very well. Some of these actors play sup-porting roles in films, and some are mainly acting in theater. It was more important for me that their performances and dialogue looked real to the audience.

MY VISIONAs a director, I believe my only and biggest task is to convey my vision precisely to the crew in the limited time we have during a production. Every time it‘s a struggle among conflicts and compromises, but I can honestly say that usually my vision is defined in the script stage. Actually, it’s most clear before writing the script. As I start to learn about the realistic conditions, my original vision begins to fade. But the talented art department, hair & make up artist and cast can revive my original vision vividly.

MAGICAL MOMENTSI think that everyday life is the succession of magical moments. From the moment a character realizes something and acts with any intention, everything starts to be real-ized. However, for me, there are surely magical moments which are difficult to explain. Sometimes I seriously think that somebody is writing my scripts from some different world as was the case in the storyline of my film Chasuke’s Journey.

MR LONG‘S RAGEFor the action scenes in MR LONG, I had to make some choices about how to portray the violence. I thought a knife or dagger would be the most appropriate weapon for Long to bring more emotion into each movement. I chose one-against-all situations to express Long’s emotion at its maximum -- all his life‘s rage, his feeling of betrayal to the townspeople who recently befriended him, and especially his regrets and sadness about Lily and little Jun.

CREATION AND DESTRUCTIONThe main location of the film is in the Japanese city of Ashikaga (Tochigi prefecture). In this city, there are many old houses still in existence, and the local film commission is very cooperative. I shot my film Happiness in the same city, and I thought it would make for a great location for this film.

In Taiwan, we shot in the city of Kaohsiung. I visited this city twice when my two films Bunny Drop and Chasuke‘s Journey were shown at the Kaohsiung Film Festival. I found good locations there such as old small alleys. It was my first experience in shooting a film in a foreign country. The Kaohsiung city government was very cooperative during the shoot.

As for the production design, it was my intention to emphasize a sense of destruction. To see in ruins where people once lived. I wanted to feel the weakness of modern society where the cycle of creation and destruction repeats with increasing speed.

CHANG CHEN AS MR LONGChang Chen, a globally renowned actor, was born in 1976, Taipei. He first earned

his attention at the age of 14 when he took the lead role in A BRIGHT SUMMER

DAY. Chang has won critical acclaim for his performance in Wong Kar-Wai‘s HAPPY

TOGETHER, EROS (opposite Gong Li) and 2046, Ang Lee‘s CROUCHING TIGER,

HIDDEN DRAGON and Hou Hsiao-Hsien‘s THREE TIMES. Since then, he was nomi-

nated three times at the Golden Horse Awards, and several times for Best Actor at the

Berlinale and the Cannes Film Festival. He won Best Actor at the 3rd Osaka Asian Film

Festival for his performance in Tian Zhuang-Zhuang‘s THE GO MASTER.

Chang‘s ability to play good and evil, coupled with his diligent learning attitude, made

him the favorite cast of world‘s renowned directors. His dedication to filmmaking is seen

not only in how he strives to improve his acting skills, but also the initiatives he had taken

in learning many languages, horse riding, the game of Go, the meditation...ect and three

years of practice bajiquan (martial arts) for THE GRANDMASTER which he later claimed

first prize in a recognized competition. Chang also demonstrated his versatility by perform-

ing John Woo‘s martial arts epic RED CLIFF, as a murdered killer in Kim Ki-Duk‘s drama

BREATH and Su Chao-Bin‘s horror movie SILK. In 2014, Chang directed his first title,

Inchworm, a short film of a three-part movie named Three Charmed Lives.

Chang‘s recent credit include Hou Hisao-Hsien‘s THE ASSASSIN, Wong Kar-Wai‘s

THE GRANDMASTER and Chen Kai-Ge‘s MONK COMES DOWN THE MOUNTAIN. He

will be seen in BROTHERHOOD OF BLADES II directed by Lu Yang.

SHO AOYAGI AS KENJIBorn on 12th April, 1985, in Hokkaido, Japan. Made his debut in the stage play “Attack

No. 1” (09). He Joined the theatrical troupe GEKIDAN EXILE, and performs in movies

/ TV dramas / theater. In 2012, he won the 22nd Japanese Movie Critics Award for Best

Newcomer with “Love for Beginners”, directed by Takeshi Furusaea. In 2013, he played

the main role in Yoshinari Nishikori’s “KON-SHIN”. His other works include “Tokyo Ref-

ugees” (14) by Kiyoshi Sasabe, “Yakuza Apocalypse” (15) by Takashi Miike, “HiGH&LOW

THE MOVIE” (16) by Shigeaki Kubo, and the TV drama series such as “Seijo” (14), “First

Class” (14), “Zanka Ryoran” (15), “Wild Heroes” (15) and “Kinpika” (16). His recent work

as the main actor is “Tatara Samurai”, by Yoshinari Nishikori, won the Best Artistic Contri-

bution Award in Montreal World Film Festival in 2016.

YITI YAO AS LILYYiti Yao studied and graduated from University of Taipei, and has worked as an actress

in TV dramas and movies since 2006. In 2012, she acted in “Dream Flight”, directed

by Khan Lee, and gained critical acclaim for her performance. In 2016, she played the

main role in the TV feature, “The Cat in the Closet”, directed by Tseng Ying-ting, which

was selected in the competition of the Taipei Film Festival In her school days, she was

a handball player, and selected as a member of the Taiwanese national handball team.

MR LONGA FILM BY SABU

2017 – Japan/HongKong, China/Taiwan/Germany – 129 minutes – Dolby 5.1 – Color - CinemaScope - in Japanese & Mandarin

MAIN CAST

Chang Chen Mr LongSho Aoyagi KenjiYiti Yao LilyRunyin Bai JunMasashi Arifuku HeisukeTaro Suwa TadaoRitsuko Okusa KumikoShiiko Utagawa MachikoYuki Mashita KimieNaoki Yamazaki ButcherHiroyuki Seguchi FishmongerShingo Mizusawa Electric Store ClerkYusuke Fukuchi JiangTetsuya Chiba SakataShunsaku Kudo Fujino

MAIN CREW

Directed and Written by SABU Director of Photography Koichi FuruyaSound Masashi Furuya Production Design China Hayashi Editor Georg Petzold Sound Design Nico Krebs Composer Junichi Matsumoto Costume Designer Kazuyo Koiso Make-up Shinji Hashimoto Line Producer Soichiro Koga Producers Koki Kageyama, Yoichi Shimizu, Jacky Pang, Stephan Holl, Shozo Ichiyama (Office Kitano)Executive Producers Ken Ariyama, Hirotaka MoriCo-Producers Antoinette Koster, Masamitsu Iwahata, Satoshi Miyazaki

a production of Live Max Film (Japan), LDH PICTURES (Japan), BLK2 Pictures (Hong Kong, China), Kaohsiung Film Fund (Taiwan), Rapid Eye Movies (Germany)in collaboration with The Post Republic (Germany)

Distribution Germany RAPID EYES MOVIES World Sales JET TONE FILMS (Hong Kong)

While hiding out in a remote Japanese town, a coldhearted killer gets a chance at love and happiness when he meets a young boy and his single mother... starring Chang Chen (RED CLIFF, THE ASSASSIN, THE GRANDMASTER, CROUCHING TIGER HIDDEN DRAGON).

From the director of CHASUKE‘S JOURNEY, MISS ZOMBIE, MONDAY and POSTMAN BLUES.

INTERNATIONAL PRESS

RICHARD LORMAND - FILM PRESS PLUSwww.FilmPressPlus.comEmail: IntlPressIT@aol.comTel: +33-9-7044-9865 (leave messages)AT THE BERLIN FILM FESTIVAL (Feb 9 –19): +49-174-850-5987

WORLD SALES

JET TONE FILMS in Berlin (Feb 9-16)Winnie Lau+1 646 593 0250 / +31 62735 7037Email: winnielau03@gmail.com