On Location: Rental Family

"We speak to Japanese director Hikari about her film Rental Family, which follows the story of Phillip, an American actor living in Tokyo (Brendan Fraser) who is recruited by an agency to play stand-in roles for strangers. When the lines of real life begin to blur on assignments as a young girl's father and as a journalist profiling a retired actor on the brink of dementia, Phillip finds himself at a moral crossroads."

"You're right - it was absolutely not peaceful! Filming in Tokyo is always more challenging because the locations are much more condensed compared to where you'd shoot in London or America. You can't stop or block people in Japan while filming, unless you're paying for the whole area, and even then, 99 per cent of the time you have to let people walk through."

Rental Family follows Phillip, an American actor in Tokyo who is recruited by an agency to play stand-in roles for strangers. Assignments include posing as a young girl's father and appearing as a journalist profiling a retired actor with dementia, and those roles begin to blur personal and performed identities, forcing moral choices. Tokyo locations are filmed to feel intimate despite the city's size. Filming in Tokyo required navigating condensed locations, public foot traffic that cannot be blocked, and securing apartment permissions by asking each resident, producing logistical patience. Hikari's move to the United States informed the protagonist's sense of belonging and displacement.

Read at CN Traveller