Takeshi Nagase is the main antagonist in The Railway Man. He is an Imperial Japanese Army officer of the same name.
He was portrayed by Tanroh Ishida and Hiroyuki Sanada.
Biography[]
Takeshi Nagase, as portrayed in the film, is a Japanese Interpreter Officer in charge of Japanese POW camps. In the film, after the fall of Singapore in 1942, Takeshi Nagase rounds up the prisoners belonging to the British Commonwealth and crowds them into trains to sends them to POW camps.
Later in the film, while forcing prisoners of war in forced labor camps to work in the "death railway" in Thailand and Burma, he takes pleasure in tormenting the prisoners, especially Eric Lomax, the main protagonist of the film. In the years after the war, Eric discovers that Nagase is still alive and escaped prosecution. Lomax then sets out to confront him for causing him pain during the war.
When Lomax confronts Nagase in Thailand at the former POW Camp, he questions him just like Nagase did during World War II. Lomax then tries to beat Nagase by smashing his arm, threatening him with a knife, and pushing him in a bamboo cage, but Lomax then frees Nagase and returns to Britain.
After Nagase gives Lomax a letter of guilt, Lomax and his wife return to Thailand and accept each other's apologies.