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More commonly associated with fashion spreads and topless shoots, actor Desmond Tan made his biggest physical transformation to date by piling on 15kg in just six weeks for Pace, premiering Oct 8.<\/p>\n
In the Mandarin movie (rated NC16), he plays Malcolm, a rehabilitated drug addict who struggles to find his place at home and in society until he earns redemption through the discipline of running.<\/p>\n
It is the first full-length feature film from director Jonathan Choo, who also scripted the movie. The 37-year-old is from a family of actors: His father, Zhu Hou Ren, and his younger brother, Joel, also have roles in Pace.<\/p>\n
The idea for the film first came to him in the months before the pandemic \u201cat a point in my life when I was running quite frequently,\u201d Choo said. \u201cI thought, \u2018Running looks great on film\u2019. And then, instantly, the idea of a prodigal son returning to a family just hit me.\u201d Subsequently, his research into addiction led him to visits to halfway houses and conversations with former drug users.<\/p>\n
At no point, though, is the film ever preachy or heavy-handed, choosing to steer clear of plot cliches and overwrought acting in favour of understated emotion, visual irony and genuinely funny moments. The result is a movie that\u2019s refreshing, heartfelt and life-affirming.<\/p>\n
Tan in the lead role was \u201cable to understand completely\u201d how \u201cshrouded in shame\u201d the character was, Choo shared. \u201cIt\u2019s not an easy thing to bring out, especially in silent moments.\u201d<\/p>\n
And, the weight gain went beyond the issue of appearance. \u201cWhen he gained that weight, and physically changed, it also helped him tap into the character emotionally,\u201d Choo said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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More commonly associated with fashion spreads and topless shoots, actor Desmond Tan made his biggest physical transformation to date by piling on 15kg in just…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":89030,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/dam.mediacorp.sg\/image\/upload\/s--v0GzD6pn--\/c_crop,h_838,w_1489,x_257,y_0\/c_fill,g_auto,h_676,w_1200\/f_auto,q_auto\/v1\/mediacorp\/cna\/image\/2026\/09\/29\/a015_1.16.3.jpg?itok=eHeNO3wc","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[12655,5361,10588,10589,12753,9250,30833,2962,1334,2748,12754],"class_list":["post-89029","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-buzz-news-sg-global","tag-15kg","tag-char","tag-desmond","tag-gained","tag-kway","tag-lemak","tag-milkshakes","tag-nasi","tag-pace","tag-tan","tag-teow","wpcat-2-id"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89029","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=89029"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/89029\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/89030"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=89029"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=89029"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sgbuzz.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=89029"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}