©Brendan Fraser in RENTAL FAMILY. Photo by James Lisle/Searchlight Pictures. © 2025 Searchlight Pictures. All Rights Reserved.
Having made his big-screen comeback to Oscar winning acclaim with Darren Aronofsky’s The Whale in 2022, Brendan Fraser has teamed up with a Japanese director Hikari for his latest outing, “Rental Family,” which takes place in Japan, check out the latest trailer from Searchlight Pictures.
Here’s the synopsis: “Set against modern-day Tokyo, “Rental Family“ follows an American actor (Fraser) who 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. Confronting the moral complexities of his work, he rediscovers purpose, belonging, and the quiet beauty of human connection.”
Besides Fraser, the film also stars Pachinko‘s Mari Yamamoto, Shōgun‘s Takehiro Hira, and Shin Godzilla‘s Akira Emoto. Hikari’s movie has a talented cast that can carry its quirky concept, and for Brendan Fraser, this is a great chance to explore the intersection of comedy, drama, punchlines, and pathos, as the resurgent 90s star has always done.
Producers are Eddie Vaisman and Julia Lebedev of Sight Unseen, Hikari and Shin Yamaguchi. Blahut, Tomo Koizumi, Jennifer Semler, Oren Moverman and Leonid Lebedev are executive producers.
The film will have its world premiere at next month’s Toronto Film Festival ahead of a November 21 release date.