Final Rating: 4.5/5
In Rental Family, Philip (Brendan Fraser) is a down on his luck American actor who has spent the past seven years in Japan living off the dream of a toothpaste commercial he once starred in and not much since. He speaks a decent level of the local language as he goes auditioning for “token American” parts. One day he gets booked to be a guest at a fake funeral service and encounters the job opportunity he has been waiting for. Director and co-writer of the film Hikari, gives the audience a warm and compassionate hug as Philip yearns for human connection in a world filled with people just floating by.
Philip is a fish out of water that manages to blend in. Brendan Fraser literally towers over the film as his stature fills doorways completely and he engulfs anyone he comes into contact with. After being hired as a seat filler at a fake funeral, he learns about the Rental Family agency, which in lieu of therapy, people in Japan hire surrogates to give closure and resolve for their problems.
That includes Philip being hired to pretend to be a fake fiance in order for the would-be bride to escape from her families control (it’s not that it’s abusive, but she can’t live the life she wants as a single woman) or the very popular service of married men who have affairs hiring the female employee of the organization to apologize to the wives once they find out about the extra marital activities.
Pretty soon Philip ends up taking these jobs so seriously, he can’t justify lying to the clients. Clients who often don’t know that someone else hired them to pretend to be their relations. Things get heavy when Philip is hired to pretend to be a young girl named Mia’s father in order to help her single mom get Mia into a good private school (which coming from a loving still together family is beneficial for applications). The catch is Mia has never met her real father and Philip is told not even she will know about the setup.
The film borders on overly saccharine sentimentality, but the emotional heft never feels unearned as Fraser, with his deep well of sadness in his eyes, is always looking for a deeper connection. One of the jobs he is hired to do is to play an interviewer for a famous actor who believes the world has forgotten about him as he slowly succumbs to dementia. So Philip spends his days listening to the actor recount his various stories, all under the guise of writing a book about him.
Things naturally go south in predictable ways, like will the little girl find out the man pretending to be her father is a fraud, or will the actor who is losing his memory want to take things too far endangering his safety?
Fraser, fresh off his comeback Oscar win for The Whale, continues to exude the immense charm that made him a star for the everyman in the 2000’s. He looms over the other actors taking up space, but he feels so far disconnected from real human emotions and desires that he shrinks down. Fraser brings a warmth and energy in an unmatched performance. It’s a reminder why he has been captivating audiences since films like The Mummy and even earlier.
He is surrounded by two veteran and recognizable Japanese actors who help command the screen. Takehiro Hira, who is most known for being in the shows Shōgun, Monarch: Legacy of Monsters and films like Rumours and Gran Turismo, plays the owner of the Rental Family agency and Mari Yamamoto (also from Monarch: Legacy of Monsters) who plays a female colleague who helps train Philip.
The film should be an absolute crowd pleaser with plenty of awards attention to follow as well. It likely will be a divisive film with people falling on the side of getting emotionally wrecked, or plenty of eye rolls.
The story features elements similar to The Farewell, where an American girl is confused by her family’s desire to hide their grandmother’s fatal cancer diagnosis. We are told several times that despite living in Japan for seven years and speaking the language, he will never truly understand their customs and culture. The east vs west way at looking at mental health is one that makes for great subject matter.
Rental Family was seen during the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival.
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