Movies: Rental Family

Brendan Fraser made a comeback for the ages with his Oscar win for The Whale, and he's followed that triumph up with another tender drama, Rental Family, directed by Hikari:

Fraser stars as Phillip, a struggling actor living alone in modern-day Japan. After Phillip gets a call about a mysterious "opportunity," he finds himself at the offices of Rental Family, a company that sends people to play various roles for paying clients.  Some jobs might be as simple as being a mourner at a funeral, but Phillip quickly gets roped into two long-term ones - pretending to be the father to a little girl, and playing a journalist interviewing a retired actor facing old age and dementia.

The movie is inspired by real-life for-hire surrogate companies, and there are some nods toward deeper societal issues (such as the stigmatization of mental health problems in Japan), but for the most part, Rental Family is content with being a lightweight feel-good movie.  Fraser is mostly the straight man, and you don't learn too much about him (one character even calls him the "token white guy"), while the Japanese supporting actors around him steal the show. Still, if you're in the mood for a sweet dramedy with some awesome shots of the Japanese countryside, you could do a lot worse.

Rating: 7/10