Why finding Dingdong’s nemesis a tough call for ‘Hard Day’ filmmaker

Dingdong Dantes in “A Hard Day”

The challenge of doing an action movie featuring Dingdong Dantes is finding a villain that could dominate him physically and outdo him in terms of acting, according to Law Fajardo, his director in “A Hard Day.”

Fajardo said that while he couldn’t think of anyone else, other than Dingdong, to play the lead role in the local adaptation of the Korean action flick, he admitted that it had been tough looking for someone who could convincingly play the “bully” to the 5-foot-9-inch actor on the big screen.

“Dingdong’s physique and demeanor matches his character. They’re also both in their late 30s,” Fajardo told Inquirer Entertainment. “The tricky part was casting his archenemy. We wanted someone who could easily overshadow him, bully him. ’Yong may saltik. It’s a good thing that Viva was able to convince my first choice, John Arcilla, to play the all-important role.”

Fajardo said that prior to shooting “A Hard Day” in May 2019, he had asked his lead star to “trim down a bit because he would be doing a lot of fight scenes here. He also had several practice sessions with our fight director. My instruction to them was to rehearse with the crew, especially with the sound team, so that they would already know what to do on the actual day of the shoot,” Fajardo pointed out.

Dingdong Dantes with John Arcilla

Compared to the Korean version, Fajardo said he made most of the fight scenes longer and, therefore, more difficult. “I extended them. I also made sure they were well-polished technically, but not too much in terms of form. I wanted these scenes to come out more organic,” he said. “If you put a lot of complicated moves, the fight scenes wouldn’t look realistic. I just wanted to see something that would likely happen in real-life fistfights.”

Fajardo only had good words for his lead star. “Dingdong is a good collaborator because he loves what he is doing. He is also very interested in this particular genre,” the director observed. “Prior to the shoot, we spoke about how I had wanted to direct the film, and I saw that he respected my vision. I also saw how dedicated he was, especially when we were shooting the car scenes. We didn’t have a stunt driver and a body double for him. It was really Dingdong who did all the scenes.”

Fajardo, in turn, respected Dingdong’s artistic inputs. “For example, he would ask for retakes for scenes that he still wasn’t satisfied with. He is very honest, that’s what I admire about him. His professionalism challenges even me, his director, to do better,” he said.

“A Hard Day” (2014) is the third installment of Viva Film’s series of Korean movie adaptations, with the Sarah Geronimo-starrer “Miss Granny” being the first, followed by “Miracle in Cell #7,” featuring Aga Muhlach.

A Chinese remake of the film, titled “Peace Breaker,” was released in 2017. “A Hard Day” is a finalist in the 1st Summer Metro Manila Film Festival, which was supposed to run this month, but was postponed due to the new coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. Also part of the cast are Janno Gibbs, Gary Lim and Al Tantay.