What’s surprising is that Mamoru Hosoda chose this of all things as the follow-up to his very creative The girl who leapt through time. What can he contribute when a script like this practically writes itself?
You could look to the comedy that ensues when the shy protagonist is roped in by his senior to be her make-believe boyfriend (aka “beard”) at a family reunion, or the breathlessly comic depiction of an extended clan of well-meaning eccentrics. It’s like Adams Family Values, but with an almost normal Japanese family.
Well, you could look at the virtual reality sequences which are at least on par (if not better) with the fantasy sequences from Hosoda’s previous film. You could admire his vision of a massively multiplayer online world that seems to incorporate the best of facebook, WOW, Second Life and eCitizen.
But what I was really marvelling at was despite the genre nature of this movie, Hosoda still manages to bring something entirely new and unexpected. Where we think of civil society and the internet as riding on a network of voluntary associations and relationships – and hence higher and purer than the relationships of the family, Hosoda makes an articulate claim that both types of relationships and networks are essential to being human, and fulfil the same basic needs of communication, intimacy, and being connected to others.
Perhaps Hosoda does need a straightforward, even genre script to facilitate his meditations into civil society and kinship networks. In any case, the resulting film is deceptively so straightforward and enjoyable that his message doesn’t feel heavy-handed at all.
It’s rare to see a film where both virtual friendships and real-world, familial relationships are celebrated equally and with sincerity.
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