After Brendan Fraser won the Oscar for The Whale in 2023, the actor said he was being “picky” about his next starring role. Now that his next movie is here, Rental Family, I think his selectiveness paid off. The latest of 2025 movie releases is a heartwarming drama that’s already received a lot of buzz at film festivals, along with positive words from critics. Now that it’s arrived in theaters, we had a chance to discuss the beautiful ending with the cast. SPOILERS are ahead.
Rental Family follows an American named Philip who has been living in Tokyo, Japan, as an actor in recent years, doing commercial work mainly. He’s approached by a “rental family” company (which actually do exist in Japan) to play make-believe roles to real people. They say they need a “token white guy”. Philip’s job gets more complicated with the company when he’s asked to play the long-lost father to a young girl, and a journalist to a retired actor. Let’s get into what happens.
What Happens At The End Of Rental Family
Philip’s genuine sense of adoration for Mia Kawasaki leads him to get closer to her than intended, but once he completes the job’s main task to help her get into a prestigious school, he disappears from her life as intended, but not without her creating a real mark on his heart. But then Mia sees Philip on her television screen playing a different role, and she confronts her mother about her realization that Philip was never her actual father. Later, Philip is able to see Mia, and they are able to reintroduce each other as friends.
Meanwhile, Philip’s other regular customer, the elderly Kikuo, has been begging him to “break him out” and take him back to his hometown, and Philip decides to ignore his family’s wishes and do so. They journey in the countryside of Japan, where Kikuo is able to retrieve pictures from his past, and get to relive his roots and the deep emotions he’d been longing to return to. But then, he has a fall, and Philip is arrested for kidnapping. Ultimately, Kikuo and his coworkers at the rental family firm find a way to get Philip absolved of his “crimes”, but Kikuo dies at the end of the movie. Philip attends his funeral – a moment that seems healing to him after having some complex emotions with his own father that led him to skip his funeral. He finally visits the shrine that Kikuo often went to. Inside, Philip is surprised to find its contents are a mirror, and he smiles at the discovery.
When I watched the scene, I was overcome with emotion, and haven’t stopped thinking about the final shot since. We’re dealing with a character who didn’t think he could help others, or really make an impact in the busy streets of Tokyo, Japan, but in that moment, he realizes that what he was searching for wasn’t this higher power or “right” answer; it has been himself the whole time.
What Brendan Fraser And The Cast Had To Say About The Ending
The final shot of the movie harkens back to something Kikuo says earlier in the movie about how “God is within us all.” Here’s what Brendan Fraser had to say about the ending from his perspective when CinemaBlend spoke to him and his costars:
Well, remember that he was told by Kikuo San to go take a look in the shrine when he asked, ‘What's in there?’ and he responded, ‘Maybe later.’ So after the story plays out, he does go to the shrine, and he does make a transformation, and he makes a discovery, an epiphany, even not only was the old man right, and you got me from the great beyond, but I am in there. I was enough all along. I didn't need to doubt myself. I'm gonna be okay going forward. That's what I always believed it to be.
From Fraser’s perspective, he finds the ending’s message to be about being “enough” and having it within yourself to emulate the divine through one’s actions. Mari Yamamoto, who plays Aiko, another one of the rental family’s agency employees, added this:
For me, I think, I've had times in my life where friends would love me in such a way that I could only think like there has to be a God. It's like a religious experience being loved by people like that. And then you see God in them in those moments, you know? And, I think the last scene tells me that if I deserve that kind of love, then there must be something inside me, too. I've had these experiences, so that last scene sort of resonated. If you look within, you can find the answers, the love that you need, like all of these things. I feel so many things watching that scene, but that's the one that comes to mind.
Rental Family is an emotional and transformational journey for Philip, who is able to help others, and for those people to help him right back after dealing with years of loneliness and feeling lost. I think the final scene perfectly shows how oftentimes when we’re lost, we tend to blame and look to outside sources, but it’s really within ourselves to find inner strength and happiness if we allow ourselves to. I love what Fraser and Yamamoto had to say about it from their perspective as well.
Apparently The Ending Was Almost Different?
During the conversation, Takehiro Hira, who plays the rental family owner Shinji, shared with us that the final shot of Rental Family wasn’t always Philip looking into the shrine. In his words:
It wasn't the original ending, was it? They changed the ending and I was like, ‘Brilliant.’ So much more meaningful.
Makes you wonder what it used to be. Brendan Fraser added this about the filming process:
Mind you, this was a film that was covered from so many different angles, and there's much of it that you're gonna wind up seeing as extras or easter eggs or whatever they're called these days, months and months from now. And that's just a testament to how thorough our director Hikari was. That's why each of these characters presents with such a rich backstory, because in realit,y there was an embarrassment of riches, a performance that was captured, but just didn't make it to the screen for time. And she was able to take all of that footage and find the story in editorial.
How amazing is it that Rental Family’s ending, which feels just right as is, was actually discovered by writer/director Hikari while making the film? It makes the ending even better, because it makes me feel like the latest of the great female directors learned something about what she wanted to say in the movie while working with the actors and having the experience of filming with them in Japan.
Rental Family is one of those life-affirming movies that I know I'll be returning to. Life is constantly one of self-discovery, and this message really hits hard.
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