MOVIEVIBE ← Back to Home

Rental Family

2025 1h 50m
Comedy Drama
MOVIEVIBE Rating
7.7/10
1,010 reviews
Your Rating
Rental Family

An American actor in Tokyo struggles to find purpose until he lands an unusual gig: working for a Japanese 'rental family' agency, playing stand-in roles for strangers. As he immerses himself in his clients' worlds, he begins to form genuine bonds that blur the lines between performance and reality.

"Happiness tailored to you!"

Top Billed Cast

Brendan Fraser
Brendan Fraser
Phillip Vanderploeg
Takehiro Hira
Takehiro Hira
Shinji Tada
Mari Yamamoto
Mari Yamamoto
Aiko Nakajima
Shannon Mahina Gorman
Shannon Mahina Gorman
Mia Kawasaki
Akira Emoto
Akira Emoto
Kikuo Hasegawa
Paolo Andrea Di Pietro
Paolo Andrea Di Pietro
Handsome Actor
Shinji Ozeki
Shinji Ozeki
Casting Director
Takao Kin
Takao Kin
Bartender

Detailed Critic & Audience Reviews

B Brent Marchant Verified TMDB Critic
2025-10-22

Forging personal connections can be difficult enough these days, even in casual circumstances. But what happens when we require someone to play a vital role for a pressing need and no one is available to stand in? That’s when it may be time to place a call to Rental Family, a Tokyo-based company that provides individuals to step in and fill the missing link. It’s also a perfect opportunity to provide work for unemployed actors, giving them a chance to ply their trade and gain experience at broadening the range of their craft while helping out others in times of need. Such is the case for P...

J justtoday1992 Verified TMDB Critic
2025-11-25

I can't wait to watch this movie. It says its already out November 20th but I still can't watch it on here or any server. Will it br up soon?...

N Nick Verified TMDB Critic
2025-11-30

**Good vibes, missed opportunities**

Rental Family delivers sweetness with Brendan Fraser charm, but stumbles in its depths

Fraser remains the MVP—his gentle giant presence and expressive vulnerability carry this film through its overly sentimental beats. Critics are right that his performance is quietly devastating, conveying awkward tenderness as he navigates Tokyo's morally murky rental family industry. The elderly client's storyline genuinely tugs at the heartstrings, offering the film's most emotionally resonant moments.

However, strip away Fraser and the film can't escape its ...

C CinemaSerf Verified TMDB Critic
2026-01-21

My, how Brendan Fraser has come on since his beefcake gardener days of “Gods and Monsters” (1998). Move on a quarter of a century and he’s “Philip”. A struggling American actor trying to make a living in Japan. He’s fluent, but thus far his success has been limited to a toothpaste advertising campaign that saw him in a cape with pearly white teeth. He makes ends meet by doing the ultimate in anonymous extras work. He turns up, unrehearsed, at events - like funerals - and gets paid what amounts to appearance money for looking sad! It’s at one of those gatherings that he meets “T...