The encounter between Japanese culture and the cultures of the rest of the world is a theme that is often explored, both by Japanese and international cinema. Japan fascinates, and Japanese filmmakers are also drawn to the experiences of those who came to Japan as religious preachers, as occupiers or business partners, or even as tourists or migrants in search of work or different life experiences. The most recent reference film would be Sofia Coppola’s ‘Lost in Translation’ (2003), a film with which Japanese director Hikari‘s ‘Rental Family‘ (2025) shares some common lines. Both films are directed by female directors who also wrote the scripts (Hikari collaborated with Stephen Blahut). The main characters are both actors. Unlike the actor played by Bill Murray in ‘Lost in Translation’, Philip from ‘Rental Family‘ never became successful. His relocation to Japan may be due to curiosity doubled by empathy, but perhaps also to a lonely life and a career that refuses to take off. The time spent here gives him the opportunity to learn the language and get to know the culture and mentality better, but for a non-Japanese, life there always holds surprises. The story in the film is very specific, but it allows viewers to experience emotions and ask questions that are universal.
When his career approaches the abyss, Philip accepts a job at a company that offers a type of service possible, perhaps, only in Japan. The company’s employees play surrogate roles in the lives of those who employ them or their loved ones: groom in a marriage in which the daughter wants to escape from her parents’ house, company for video game enthusiasts, fake mistress on whom the wife can vent her anger instead of the real mistress, etc. The decision to accept the job is not without hesitation, as it is clearly a psychological scam, but the charismatic head of the company convinces him that the influence of appropriate lies is positive in the lives of those who pay for these services. However, two of the roles will involve Philip emotionally more than he expected: that of a journalist who interviews a once famous actor who begins to lose his memory and with it his self-esteem, and that of a father hired by the mother of a little girl who needs the presence of a partner to enroll her daughter in a prestigious school. When the stage is real life, roles that impact the fate of others risk becoming personal problems for the ‘actor’.
In this film that has as its theme the meeting of two worlds, the ‘West’ is represented by
Brendan Fraser, the actor who plays the role of Philip. His tall silhouette and the space that he occupies awkwardly in the crowds of the Japanese capital visually differentiate him from those around him. Fraser, an actor I’ve really liked in other films, adopts a somewhat monotonous expression throughout the film, but very appropriate for a character who makes ‘very best efforts’ to understand and respect the culture he’s immersed in, even if they don’t always succeed and are understood. Director Hikari is an actress by training and this is evident in the way she chose and worked with her actors. The script can be criticized for an excess of melodrama, especially towards the end where the ‘predictable surprises’ appear, but it’s one of those cases where melodrama worked well for me. The modes of expression can be very different in different cultures, but the vibrations of the souls are the same, beyond the differences. The sincerity of the emotion won me over, and the questions about the fragile balances between truth and lies, about the good and bad lies we tell and hear in everyday life, about the actor’s art moved from stages or screens to real life, made watching this film a memorable experience.