Rental Family (2025) [Film Review]: A Beautiful Blend of Humor, Emotion, and Unlikely Connections

Hikari’s Rental Family could have easily tipped into saccharine territory, but instead it strikes a gentle, reflective tone. Bolstered by an empathetic script co-written by Hikari and Stephen Blahut, and a quietly magnetic lead turn from Brendan Fraser, the film turns the oddity of Japan’s rental-human industry into a warm, morally curious character piece. It’s sentimental without being cloying, funny without undermining its emotional stakes.

Premise & Themes

Renting people to heal private gaps becomes a mirror for modern loneliness

Set in sunlit corners of Tokyo rather than the familiar neon gloom, Rental Family follows Phillip Vandarploueg (Fraser), a middling foreign actor who ekes out a living by pretending to be other people for paying clients. The conceit — celebrities of necessity standing in for absent relatives, faux mourners, counterfeit companions — becomes fertile ground for questions about authenticity, compassion, and the boundaries between role-playing and real feeling. The movie asks: when does a good performance become something like love, and what are the ethical costs when fiction bleeds into someone’s life?

Direction & Screenplay

Light-handed direction and a nimble, melancholic script

Hikari directs with an unobtrusive elegance, letting small gestures and silences accumulate rather than hitting every emotional beat with a hammer. The screenplay balances comic assignments (a staged bridegroom, a hired video-game pal) with two plotlines that probe deeper moral complexity: a faux-journalist assignment involving an aging actor, and a father-for-hire job meant to boost a young girl’s future prospects. These threads occasionally skirt implausibility, but the film’s humane attention to consequences keeps them grounded. Hikari and Blahut wisely favor scenes of quiet connection over broad explanation.

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Performances

Fraser’s melancholic charm and a sensitive ensemble

Brendan Fraser is the film’s beating heart. He conveys a world-weariness that never tips into cynicism; Phillip is an actor who has learned to hide longing behind professional composure, and Fraser makes those small cracks matter. Takehiro Hira’s brusque but layered Shinji, the efficient rental-family boss, and Mari Yamamoto’s Aiko, who carries the emotional weight of tougher gigs, round out a cast that understands the film’s tonal tightrope. Young Shannon Gorman, as the child at the center of a fraught assignment, brings honest vulnerability that elevates the ethical dilemmas into real human stakes.

Visuals & Tone

Bright daylight, clean frames, and an understated emotional palette

Cinematographer Takurô Ishizaka favors natural light and composed frames, a welcome contrast to Tokyo stories that rely solely on nocturnal moodiness. This daylight aesthetic makes the film feel open and compassionate; even its darker moments are suffused with a warmth that argues for human connection. The score and sound design never overwhelm the performances, allowing emotional beats to breathe.

Flaws & Reservations

A touch of melodrama and an occasionally convenient plot

At moments, the film leans into sentimentality, and one of the major plotlines stretches credibility—yet the movie largely earns its emotional payoffs. A few supporting characters are underwritten, and certain reversals arrive too neatly. Still, these are small quibbles in an otherwise thoughtful piece.

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Verdict

A quietly moving fable about the costs and comforts of pretending

Rental Family is a tender, humane film that makes a strange service feel philosophically rich and dramatically rewarding. It’s recommended for viewers who like character-driven stories about identity and connection, and for anyone who appreciates Brendan Fraser’s ability to render loneliness with warmth and wit. Not every question the movie raises is answered, but it leaves you thinking about the performances we hire and the truths we hide — and that, in this film, feels exactly right.

Rating: 7.5 out of 10