Family Romance, LLC. The film’s title refers to a real Tokyo-based firm called Family Romance, which hires out actors to serve as relatives and companions for social occasions.
Yuichi Ishii, the founder of the firm, plays himself in the lead role, giving the film the air of a documentary, a feeling which is enhanced by Herzog’s rough and ready camerawork.
It is, however, no documentary, but a carefully scripted meditation on the nature of emotional connection.Tokyo seems an unusual setting for a film by Herzog, who has a penchant for extreme locations like the Sahara desert, the Amazon rainforest and Antarctica.