Wayne Wang, the director of "Smoke," has adapted Junichiro Tanizaki's novel "Diary of a Mad Old Man" into a film of the same title, starring Lily Franky, Fan Bingbing and Takumi Saito. It will open in summer 2027 at Theater Shinjuku in Tokyo and elsewhere around Japan, and stills from the film have been released.
The story is set in modern Tokyo. Utsugi, 69, is recovering from a stroke when he begins to fixate on Susu, his daughter-in-law, who cares for him. His desire for sex grows even as his body weakens. Their tense relationship gradually blurs the line between seduction and delusion.
The film screened in the Gala Selection section of the 39th Tokyo International Film Festival, where Wang, Franky and Saito took part in a talk session.
“We've screened at various international film festivals and tasted both great popularity and great unpopularity. There were lots of festival directors who just wouldn't accept it, and people who loved it. It's exactly the kind of film Kō and I like best.”Lily Franky, actor
Saito said he had heard, at a great distance and through Franky, that Wang was planning to adapt Tanizaki, and that as a film fan he was happy the finished work had reached audiences.
A comedy next, Wang suggests
“Maybe next time I should make a comedy with these two in the lead. I've already made "Smoke" and "Blue in the Face," so this time a sequel to "Diary of a Mad Old Man"...”Wayne Wang, director
Franky said Wang had told him about 10 years ago that he wanted to make a film on the theme of old men's sexuality, and had asked his advice on writing the plot. Wang later told him that various American actors had turned the part down, so "you'll do," Franky recalled, adding that he had thought: "What? I'm going to be in it?"
Wang corrected him: it was he who had turned the actors down, not the other way around. He asked the audience whether they remembered Marlon Brando in "The Teahouse of the August Moon," a film set in Japan, and said a white man appearing in this film would feel very wrong.
“After various twists and turns, it ended up with a Japanese and a Chinese cast, made by a Chinese-American director as an American film — the most peaceful possible setup. Eros really does connect the world!”Lily Franky, actor
Franky said people with disabilities, and old men and old women, are expected to behave in society as if they had no awareness of sex. That, he said, is the ego of the young and the able-bodied, and it is not how things are.
“An old man sitting blankly in a park is looking at a mom's backside.”Lily Franky, actor
He said Japanese films have long portrayed the old man who makes a pass at his son's wife, but such characters are usually very macho and treat women as weak, making for unpleasant scenes. Wang, by contrast, has a boy's heart and is a clean person, so the result is pop, Franky said. He saw the film in Canada, where audiences laughed until their stomachs hurt, and was surprised to find he had made something people laughed at.
Franky said that midway through shooting, Wang told him he had something to discuss, and worried that if the film were shot as it stood it would turn out to be merely a "good film." Thanks to excellent staff, an eel arrived on set three days later, he said.
Saito said the atmosphere on set made clear it was not a production where you prepare according to what is written on the page and arrive ready to shoot. The set, he said, was full of a curiosity that would go along with wherever things turned.
Wang said the script is an important foundation, but that sticking to it makes a film boring, especially when working with actors as fine as the two leads and an actress as fine as Fan. Sometimes he shoots as written, he said, and sometimes he shoots the eel scene.
Franky said many scenes had been cut, and that the more effort a scene took, the more likely it was to be cut. He praised Wang for slicing away the explanatory parts.
Wang credited his good fortune with strong scenes, and recalled what Paul Schrader told him when their offices were both in Francis Ford Coppola's building: the most important thing in editing is to cut whatever is unrelated to the story and the protagonist. Even if only 15 minutes remain, Schrader said, that is fine, because that is the heart of the story and it can be expanded from there.
Franky said Fan makes everything glamorous and turns the shoot into a film from the moment she is there, describing her as cheerful, bright and serious about acting. In a scene where he licks her foot, he said, she was so thorough that she called in a French pedicure technician to look after her feet right up to the moment of shooting.
- Director: Wayne Wang
- Cast: Lily Franky, Fan Bingbing, Takumi Saito
- 2026, United States