Director Gong’s okay sign followed imdiately after. Next ca the long-awaited scene between Chen Wei and Influencer 1. Every single staff mber was tense.
And yet, simply making it this far without any major mistakes created a strange sense of exhilaration.
Because of that, nobody looked nervous. Despite the brutally tight schedule, everyone was smiling.
“How much ti do we have left?”
“Three hours!”
“Okay. Good, good-.”
It might have sounded like plenty of ti, but it wasn’t.
After this scene ca Joo Junseo’s solo scene, along with the most important fountain pen spinning action sequence. After checking the ti, Director Gong shouted,
“Alright then, Chen Wei! Let’s go!”
The scenes Han Yeoreum and Joo Junseo shared together in Macau were very short. It was the scene where the two first t after entering Chen Wei’s boss room.
In other words, greetings.
They needed to film the two of them both entering and leaving the room.
This was the section where Han Yeoreum’s subtle changes in expression and Joo Junseo’s Chinese dialogue would beco the key points.
* * *
Knock knock-.
Standing before the dark mahogany door, I knocked.
“Co in.”
Joo Junseo’s voice ca from inside. Slowly, I turned the doorknob and opened the door. The heavy weight of it felt like it was pressing down on my heart.
In film, doors were never just simple objects.
They were also boundary lines dividing before and after.
The act of opening a door and stepping inside was like crossing a river you could never return from.
Influencer 1 opened three doors.
When she first entered the casino floor, she still belonged to the realm of ordinary people hoping for luck. But the mont she stepped into the junket room, she beca a gambler.
And then the final door.
The mont she entered the boss room, she truly stepped onto a road with no turning back.
“....”
Half leaning against the dark desk, Chen Wei ironically carried the most weight out of all the villains in 〈Faster Than the Law〉.
Joo Junseo appeared amid a dark silence that seed unwilling to permit even the slightest noise.
The roulette sounds that had been ringing chaotically through the casino just monts ago, along with the soft classical music from the junket room, abruptly faded away.
There were three primal fears humans instinctively felt.
Silence.
Ignorance.
And unfamiliarity.
Chen Wei was the man who taught all of those things to Influencer 1.
From the noisy casino all the way to the elegant junket room, there was an oppressive sense that everything from beginning to end rested beneath Chen Wei’s feet.
There was no playful smile. No fake kindness.
He revealed his presence simply by quietly breathing.
Wrapped in dark colors from head to toe, Chen Wei was a man about whom Influencer 1 knew absolutely nothing.
And that very fact—that she knew nothing about him—made Influencer 1 shrink in on herself.
After K, the sleazy club operator, and Director Sa, the approachable-looking elite, ca Chen Wei, the man behind the largest-scale international cri yet.
“Hello.”
Chen Wei was also the quietest character of them all, a giant figure one could only et after opening multiple layered doors.
A villain capable of instantly transforming Macau’s constantly moving, vibrant atmosphere into absolute stillness.
Creak.
Drawn in by Chen Wei, Influencer 1 unconsciously stepped one foot into the boss room.
At the sa ti, the mont she released the handle, the heavy door swung shut under its own weight.
Click.
Everything beyond the closed door belonged to Chen Wei’s territory.
The innermost core, accessible only to those granted permission.
Control had completely passed over to the other side.
Chen Wei spoke again in a foreign language that could only feel unfamiliar.
“Welco.”
Chen Wei smoked the most widely recognized harsh cigarette, its tip glowing red. White smoke slipped from his lips. A language whose aning she didn’t understand tightened her eardrums with tension.
The nightscape of the Cotai Strip spreading behind Chen Wei dazzled brightly. It looked as though the entire district belonged to him.
Influencer 1 stared blankly at it.
Not because she was frightened at being isolated with a stranger.
Not because she was bewildered by a situation she couldn’t understand.
Instead, she turned trembling eyes back toward Chen Wei, wondering how much she could gain from being here.
* * *
Han Yeoreum completed her part without a single NG. During the thirty-minute break that followed, Joo Junseo drank water while recalling what had just happened.
The middle cuts had been omitted. They would have to film those back in Korea.
Without exchanging any dialogue, Chen Wei and Influencer 1 moved directly into the scene where they parted ways.
The casino access pass Chen Wei handed over.
It was a gold card that granted unlimited access into the glittering world of the night.
The feeling of becoming soone special was bait Influencer 1 loved more than anything else.
And when Han Yeoreum accepted it and left the boss room, she looked like an entirely different person.
Pure evil.
That was how Joo Junseo wanted to define it.
Influencer 1, caring only about her own excitent while completely failing to recognize the danger and immorality surrounding her.
How dangerous this place was.
How many cris lurked here.
Where the money flowing from those VIPs truly ca from.
She had no interest in any of it.
Soone special.
Soone lucky.
Soone chosen.
Influencer 1, portrayed as one of the “good guys” in 〈Faster Than the Law〉. Han Yeoreum gave complete plausibility to the process of such a character sinking into a swamp of evil through nothing but changes in expression alone.
The expression of Influencer 1 intoxicated by those feelings felt vivid.
And that kind of ticulous acting was sothing Joo Junseo had never even dared attempt himself.
〈ParCheHi〉, where he played the rebellious romance-manga male lead.
〈Top Class〉, where he played a silent bodyguard.
〈Manager at Twelve O’Clock〉, where he once again portrayed a stoic character.
And now.
Chen Wei, the new ruler of Macau, frightening precisely because nobody could grasp his true identity.
“....”
Joo Junseo was not an actor known for expressive facial acting.
The tiny gestures he had learned while working as a model were what barely created his distinguishing traits. He was weak in close-ups.
And he knew that himself.
But now that he had witnessed Han Yeoreum’s subtle changes in expression directly before his eyes, he found himself overwheld by an indescribable feeling.
That emotion he had felt on the rooftop during the final filming day of 〈ParCheHi〉.
Sothing on a completely different level from rely thinking soone was good at acting.
The sensation of becoming the protagonist reflected within Han Yeoreum’s terrifyingly imrsive gaze.
Co to think of it, Pi Chaewon crying while looking at him on that rooftop and Influencer 1 entering the room had one thing in common.
‘Her gaze keeps clinging to you.’
That stare digging in {N•o•v•e•l•i•g•h•t} as though nothing else mattered. A blind gaze focused only on the target she wanted.
“Junseo! Let’s do one rehearsal-!”
Joo Junseo rose to his feet. The fountain pen tucked inside his jacket rattled softly with the movent.
“Please walk from over there to here just once.”
Soone had dared rig the gas in a junket room where tens of billions exchanged hands.
Chen Wei personally went to catch them.
This was the scene where he rcilessly stabbed through the hand of the culprit who had secretly stolen cards.
A scene simultaneously showing off the glamorous luxury of the junket room while revealing Chen Wei’s brutality.
Before Influencer 1 ever arrived in Macau.
In other words, an opening scene ant to establish dominance over the audience imdiately.
Put simply, it was Chen Wei’s self-introduction scene.
“You grab the back of his neck, slam! Pin him down. Then pull out the fountain pen and spin it. We’ll do everything up to there in one take.”
Listening to the director’s explanation, Joo Junseo nodded.
He knew better than anyone that among the villains of the 〈Faster Than the Law〉 series, he was the weakest when it ca to acting skill.
He couldn’t beat K through expressions.
He couldn’t beat Director Sa through action scenes.
But now, at last, it felt like he had found a breakthrough.
The gaze.
If he could only have that gaze that relentlessly hunted down its target.
“Stand by-.”
Joo Junseo felt a bit regretful.
If his scenes with Han Yeoreum had happened just a little earlier, the quality of the scenes they fild yesterday probably would have been completely different.
“Ready!”
But there were still five days left.
“Action!”
And he felt certain he could still change within that ti.
Thanks to soone who rewound ti before his eyes in an instant.
A gambler who had fallen completely into the world of gambling without even exchanging a single proper conversation.
Now he understood Han Yeoreum, the woman with Influencer 1’s eyes.
* * *
While the staff hurriedly dismantled the filming equipnt, Director Gong stood there blankly.
Because of the action performance Joo Junseo had just shown.
“....”
There were things directors could see once they beca directors.
Because actors trapped inside the fra perford with absolute honesty.
People who lacked character study looked low-resolution.
People who hadn’t fully morized their lines displayed unnecessary little movents or revealed their characteristic habits.
If one had to describe it, Joo Junseo gave textbook performances.
He was the kind of actor who followed the director’s instructions well.
But the Chen Wei he had shown just now was clearly different from the one he displayed on the first day.
He hadn’t deviated from Director Gong’s direction at all.
The length of his strides.
The angle of the arm driving the fountain pen downward.
Everything followed the director’s instructions exactly.
And yet sothing had definitely changed.
‘In just one day?’
The hand spinning as fast as if the footage had been sped up.
The eyes staring straight at the hand he had pierced through.
Through every nonverbal detail, Joo Junseo was explaining sothing.
That he alone was the owner of this place.
‘This....’
Past records flashed through Director Gong’s mind.
〈Faster Than the Law 1〉 — 10.12 million viewers.
〈Faster Than the Law 2〉 — 11.08 million viewers.
‘Maybe....’
For the first ti, he began thinking that 〈Faster Than the Law 3〉 might break the franchise’s highest audience record yet.
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