JAPANESE actor Ken Takakura may have inspired some of the greatest movie lines in Asian film, but for fan Chen Danqiu, the stoic actor inspired a love of trench coats.

    With the announcement of Takakura’s death Tuesday, whose roles as an onscreen tough guy earned him the accolade as one of Japan’s greatest actors, Chinese fans have taken to the Internet to mourn the cinema legend.

    “I also like horse riding, Hokkaido, Japanese novels from the 1970s and 1980s — all because of him,” Chen, a cultural commentator, wrote in an article commemorating the death of the 83-year-old, who died of lymphoma Nov. 10.

    On China’s social networking platforms, fans of the renowned star paid respect and declared their love by quoting lines from his hit movie “Manhunt,” the film that made Takakura a household name.

    The tightly knit suspense film, starring Takakura as an upright procurator who struggles to prove his innocence after being framed for a crime, was among the first batch of Japanese movies allowed into China in 1978, shortly after the country’s decade-long “Cultural Revolution.”

    Boasting a career spanning half a century and roles in some 200 films, he is perhaps best known to Western audiences for his role as a Japanese police officer alongside Michael Douglas in the 1989 Hollywood film “Black Rain.”

    The iconic cool he exuded onscreen captured numerous hearts in China. “For me, he doesn’t represent an actor, but an image, an image that epitomizes bravery, loyalty and stoic strength,” Chen wrote.

    Unsurprisingly, he was a major heartthrob for Chinese women at the time. “As a child, I sneaked a peek at a love letter my mom wrote to my dad. In it, she said, ‘At first glance, you looked like Ken Takakura.’ That was when I first heard the name,” said a user on microblog Sina Weibo.

    The veteran actor helped redefine the image Chinese males hoped to obtain for an entire generation. His style was widely mimicked by Chinese actors in the 1980s, said Professor Shi Chuan, vice chair of the Shanghai Film Association.

    Famous Chinese director Zhang Yimou, whose 2005 picture “Riding Alone for Thousands Miles” starred the Japanese actor as a father, also expressed his grief. “I can’t believe this — my old friend is gone. I can merely express my deep condolences and wish him happiness in heaven,” he wrote on Sina Weibo.

    The director previously told the media that he has long idolized Takakura, and the film, a heartwarming story of a Japanese father who travels to rural China to fulfill the wish of his dying son, was tailor-made for him.

    Shi believes the role of a loving father marked a major change to Takakura’s consistent “tough guy” image onscreen and reflected a shift in Japanese men’s mentality.

    “In the 1970s, with the economic boom, they fixated on career and neglected family. In the twilight of their life, they paid the price and began to fix the problem,” Shi said.

    Even though Japanese movies have been marginalized by their U.S. counterparts in Chinese theaters today, Zhang Xiaohui said the current clout of Hollywood blockbusters and stars in China could not compare with that of Takakura and the “horizon-broadening” Japanese movies three decades ago. (Xinhua)