Rental Family movie spotlights real-life Japanese businesses

Ryuichi Ichinokawa's life could be right out of the movie Rental Family as the founder nearly two decades ago of the Heart Project business in Japan – which he bills as a surrogate attendance service complete with furnishing of extras and family members.

He has hired dozens of people to act like reporters with cameras and voice recorders, taking notes and milling with real journalists to fill up an otherwise rather vacant event. He has posed as the boyfriend of a woman who needs to discuss legal paperwork with her former spouse. And he has gone to a hospital as a stand-in husband for a woman getting fertility treatments.

“I am being of service to people. I hope they will be happy,” said Ichinokawa, a dapper elderly man who asked The Associated Press to not be photographed lest his identity become public.

Rental Family, a moving drama from Searchlight Pictures starring Brendan Fraser, could be sure to spark interest in Japan's real-life industry.

The film centres on Phillip, an American actor who was recruited by a Tokyo “rental family” agency in need of a “token white guy". His recurring jobs range from playing video games with a loner to portraying a little girl's long absentee father.

It isn't long before Phillip started to become emotionally invested in what were supposed to be superficial relationships. The film's Japanese supporting cast also brings to life the intense highs and lows of assuming a role in a stranger's life.

In reality, these niche businesses have highlighted how deeply people in Japan experienced loneliness or worry about keeping up appearances. Outsiders may cringe at the idea of paying amateur actors to be fake family members or friends. But users say they find these services comforting and even healing.

The film's director, Mitsuyo Miyazaki whose professional name is Hikari, was born in Japan yet knew little about the concept. Once she learned about it, she couldn't stop thinking about what a unique story it could inspire. So Hikari started researching and found hundreds of companies in Japan that offered rental families or similar services. She spoke with several people in that world.

“I kind of started tackling those questions, and interviewed them on what are the necessities of the business that needs to happen in Japan. And then that’s how I kind of built stories,” Hikari said.

Even at a time when people sought company through Artificial Intelligence, she thought hiring of actors to fill emotional voids would always be in demand.

“I don’t think they will disappear, honestly, it might just probably expand,” she said.

In Ichinokawa's experience, most people who asked for the service had a certain social status to protect. He'd organised visits to a bar for a hostess who wanted to impress her employer with lots of clientele. Similar to the movie, Ichinokawa has gone to school events with a single mother and her child, acting as a friendly uncle.

Sometimes Ichinokawa takes extra steps to ensure the facade. If required, he would print fake business cards — which were routinely exchanged at Japanese gatherings.

Some parts were easy, like being a wedding guest who just sat and ate. But it’s often been stressful work. You're coached to avoid uttering the wrong name or background information. You might have to be prepared to talk about childhood memories you had no clue about. Ichinokawa used to scribble names on his hand. He also pored over notes in advance. If he was really desperate, he excused himself to the restroom.

Payment for getting rented out varied. For Heart Project, the relatively easy roles could make 9800 yen (NZD$111) for a couple of hours. For the more elaborate parts, the client dished out 20,000 yen (NZD$227) to 30,000 yen (NZD$341) per person.

Ichinokawa's rule was that you only play a role once. To do it more than once was setting yourself up for failure. And he has never failed in his mission, he added proudly.

“I don’t feel I am acting. I really get angry if that’s what the situation requires,” he said.

Japan has long grappled with loneliness, high suicide rates and a stigma surrounding mental illness. After a 2011 earthquake and tsunami, the country examined how the disasters were affecting mental health, said Miwa Yasui, a professor at the University of Chicago whose research includes the influence of culture on mental health.

Today, there were more mental health providers and an understanding of the need for counseling in Japan. During the pandemic, volunteers focused on teen depression started an online Japanese-language chat service.

Japanese people isolated physically were prone to feeling it internally, said Chikako Ozawa-de Silva, author of The Anatomy of Loneliness: Suicide, Social Connection and the Search for Relational Meaning in Contemporary Japan.

“When people feel they’re not loved, they are not accepted, they’re now seeing they’re not heard. The sense of ‘I don’t matter’ is a form of loneliness,” said Ozawa-de Silva, who is also a professor at Emory University.

This can lead to “hikikomori", where people withdraw socially and become shut-ins for months or even years.

Japanese culture's collectivist nature also contributed to hiding mental health challenges. Children were taught the principle of “minna no tame ni" or for the sake of everybody, Yasui said. As adults, there was pressure to maintain harmony and make sure the needs of others — work or family — were met.

“Within Asian cultures, there’s a concept of loss of face,” Yasui said. “If you lose that, that actually has significant implications.”

In Ozawa-de Silva's opinion, renting actors for surface-level intimacy was putting a plaster on a deeper problem.

“I'm not against that,” Ozawa-de Silva said. “If people can buy time by renting a family, while pursuing much better long-term solutions, I think the rental family could be a very, very beneficial thing.”

While someone with a Western mindset might have found renting actors bizarre, many Japanese people found it reassuring. Much of the written feedback Ichinokawa got expressed relief or appreciation: “Thank you for today. You really interacted with us like a real mother. My boyfriend kept saying, ‘What a great mom".” From a male client: “Please relay my regards to the person who played the role of my wife and tell her she was a superb wife.”

The film, which will be released in February in Japan, uses the rental family concept to remind people that human nature's need for connection was not something you could suppress.

“When you help somebody and if they feel like you’re being supportive, that makes you feel good,” Hikari said. “And a family member doesn’t have to be always blood-related.”