(The Middleburg Film Festival ran October 16-19 in Middleburg, Virginia, and lead critic Chris Reed is on the ground doing coverage for us. Check out his Rental Family movie review! Seen it? Join the conversation with HtN on our Letterboxd Page.)
In Rental Family, Brendan Fraser (The Whale) plays Phillip Vandarpleog, an American actor at loose ends in Japan, where he’s lived for 7 years. When a surprising new opportunity comes his way, he doesn’t exactly jump at it but rather eases into the odd circumstances. Mixing genuine comedy with heartfelt drama, director and co-writer Hikari (37 Seconds) crafts a delightful fish-out-of-water tale that is also an examination of a phenomenon unique to her native country.
That would be the titular “rental family,” where people hire actors to play the part of absent friends or relatives, whether actual (as in, real but not physically present) or imaginary (as in, they don’t exist yet you wish they did). As Shinji (Takehiro Hira, Gran Turismo), the owner of such a business, explains to Phillip within the film, mental-health therapy is stigmatized in Japan, so it’s easier for many to choose fiction over psychoanalysis. If it works, who’s complaining?
Phillip’s introduction to this strange (to him) world is via a phone call from his agent telling him to show up to a gig to play a “sad American.” It turns out to be a funeral…for someone very much still alive. Despite the inherent humor in Phillip’s bumbling late arrival and the shock when the corpse sits up, powerful emotions undergird the scene, since the fake ceremony is to help the client feel better and choose life over suicide. This combination of tones continues (successfully) throughout.
Thereafter, Phillip is hired by Shinji for other roles as his “token white guy.” The first of these is as the missing father of a biracial girl whose mother needs a husband in order for her daughter to qualify for a slot at a competitive secondary school. That kid, Mia (Shannon Gorman) is understandably skeptical at first, but soon warms to him. We know that Phillip will eventually have to face the ethical music, however, as soon as Mia makes him pinky swear to never leave again.
Shinji gives Phillip other jobs, too, including one where he plays a journalist doing a profile of an aging movie star, Kikuo (Akira Emoto, Shoplifters); his daughter wants him to experience the joy of being remembered before his dementia further progresses. In all his roles, Phillip conveys the genial warmth that has often been Fraser’s trademark, while trying not to get too close. But that’s the thing about deception, even those undertaken with the best of intentions: one day, the truth will out.
Shinji’s other employees—Aiko (Mari Yamamoto, Kate) and Kota (Kimura Bun)—struggle with their dual lives, as well, Rental Family asking us, amid the frequent bursts of raucous laughter, to consider what happens when we deny our authentic selves. The ending is profoundly cathartic in the kind of restrained way that resonates far beyond the final moments. Come for the intriguing premise, stay for the lingering insights.
– Christopher Llewellyn Reed (@ChrisReedFilm)
Middleburg Film Festival; Hikari; Rental Family movie review
Post a Comment
