18/01/26

Cineworld, Edinburgh

This whimsical, Japanese-set film was previously the subject of Oscar buzz, but seems to have slipped quietly out of contention. It’s a charming and affecting tale and, if there’s a danger of it occasionally straying towards ‘White Saviour’ territory, writer/director Hikari mostly manages to keep everything just the right side of the line.

Phillip Vanderploeg (Bendan Fraser) is an American actor, currently in his seventh year of residence in Tokyo. The former star of a successful toothpaste commercial, he’s now grimly attending auditions for proper acting roles without much success. When his agent sends him along to a job as an extra, he’s bewildered to find that he’d been cast as a mourner at a funeral – and that the man in the coffin is still alive. Afterwards, he meets Shinji (Takahiro Hira), who runs the company, Rental Family. They specialise in providing actors who can play stand-in family members or friends for lonely strangers (and, before you raise your eyebrows, let me assure you that agencies like this are long-established in Japan). Shinjo tells Phillip that he’s been looking for a token white guy. Would he be interested in signing up?

Pretty soon, Phillip’s finding regular work with the agency. He plays a stand-in straight husband for a woman who is secretly gay, but wants to give her parents the conventional wedding experience they expect. He is hired to ‘interview’ elderly film director, Kikuo Hasegawa (Akira Emoto), once much revered by the industry but now slipping into the realms of dementia. And he is asked to play the absent father of Mia (Shannon Mahina Gorman), a young half-Japanese girl whose mother wants her to attend an elite high school and needs to have a visible father-figure in attendance in order to improve her chances.

Inevitably, Phillip finds himself becoming emotionally involved with the people he works with, even though Shinji keeps warning him to stay detached from his clients…

Rental Family hits plenty of pleasing notes as the story unfolds, and its depiction of Japan is exuberant and colourful, making me wish I could experience it for myself. There’s some barbed criticism of one aspect of the agency’s services – the supplying of stand-in ‘mistresses’ for aggrieved wives to vent their anger on – but again, this is something that genuinely happens.

Fraser handles the role of Phillip with his customary skill, managing to convey a whole variety of emotions with little more than a grimace or a smile. I do however find myself unconvinced by one decision he makes concerning Kikuo – would anyone of his maturity act so rashly? But his interplay with Mia is nicely judged and there are moments here that have me wishing I’d come armed with a handkerchief. There’s also a late-stage revelation concerning one of Phillip’s co-workers that really does take me utterly by surprise.

Overall, Rental Family makes for enjoyable viewing. But be warned: one scene where Phillip and Kikuo share a delicious-looking meal in a tiny barbecue restaurant may have you leaving the cinema feeling absolutely ravenous.

3.8 stars

Philip Caveney