Nanako Matsushima brings urgency without fuss to people expected to know what to do. Her restraint is a considerable asset in Ring, where she keeps us interested in the investigation even when the writing falters.
Fi1m perspective
In Ring (1998), Nanako Matsushima makes the business of finding things out feel urgent, even when the film is taking too long to do it. Her Reiko Asakawa is a journalist investigating a cursed videotape, a premise that needs an actor who will take it seriously without insisting that we do. Matsushima supplies that seriousness without fuss. We were frightened because her urgency kept us involved through stretches that might otherwise have felt like waiting for the next clue.
The television career places her repeatedly in jobs that require authority: teacher, doctor, housekeeper. After the lead in Himawari (1996), A Story of Love (1997) and Great Teacher Onizuka (1998) helped establish her. Ring belongs to that period, rather than marking a permanent departure for horror. Television remained central, with the title role in I'm Mita, Your Housekeeper (2011) among her later leads. That continuity matters: the everyday credibility needed for these roles is also what makes Reiko's predicament persuasive.
Hideo Nakata's direction gives that performance room to work. He allows us time to look and worry, and Matsushima does not try to fill the pauses by announcing how serious everything is. Hiroyuki Sanada, playing Ryuji Takayama, works with a similar restraint; the two had already appeared together in A Story of Love. They hold our interest when the script is busy supplying information. The writing is not always sure of itself, and neither actor can make every stage of the investigation compelling, but they give us a reason to stay attentive.
Later work includes supporting roles, among them Shield of Straw (2013), and animation, voicing Yoriko Sasaki in When Marnie Was There (2014). Those are different uses for an actor whose established strength is the authority she brings to professional women under pressure. We would welcome more genre work that tests that authority, giving her a problem to solve rather than simply a threat to react to. Start with Ring, provided a few slow stretches do not put you off.
Biography
Nanako Matsushima is a Japanese actress and model. She made her screen debut in the mid-1990s after beginning her career as a fashion model and rose to prominence with leading roles in television dramas, including the NHK Asadora Himawari (1996) and GTO: Great Teacher Onizuka (1998).
She is best known internationally for her role as Reiko Asakawa in the horror film Ring (1998). Other notable screen credits include Ring 2 (1999), Whiteout (2000), Shield of Straw (2013) and the voice of Yoriko Sasaki in the animated feature When Marnie Was There (2014). Matsushima has received multiple Japan Television Drama Academy Awards for her television work.
In 2001 she married actor Takashi Sorimachi, with whom she had previously co-starred.
