Hi folks, how you doing? Welcome along to another episode of soundtracking with me, Edith Bowman.

Now, I am recording this on the morning of Sunday, the 11th of January. Obviously, by the time you hear

this, the Golden Globes will have happened. I probably will have stayed up most of the night to

find out who's won what. So I might reflect on that

next week's episode, but I wanted to get this episode recorded and out to you so that you

could enjoy it. Have something look forward to on that Monday morning or Monday lunchtime or Monday

on your way home or whenever you listen to it. But thank you so much for actually taking the time to listen to us.

I never take it for granted and I really appreciate your ears, your time and your attention.

And I hope you enjoy what we are bringing you.

Just before I get into this week's episode, I know that I said at the end of last week's episode with the Hamlet guys, Chloe, Jesse and Paul, that we were going to have Bobby Krillick, aka the Hacks and Cloak on this week's episode.

My huge apology is totally my fault.

I got my release dates wrong.

Bobby will be coming up week after next.

So it will be well worth waiting for, I promise.

Listen, our latest guest on soundtracking is Hikari, co-writer and director of the heartwarming

comedy drama rental family. It stars Brendan Fraser and it's the story of his character

who is an American actor based in Japan. He's not doing that well

and he takes a job with an agency that provides kind of standing family members or specific people

for strangers. This is a really wonderfully immersive experience. I was lucky enough to go to Japan years ago when I did a travel show called Rough Guide and I fell in love with the place and I've been desperately trying to get back ever since. I really want to take my boy Rudy there because I think he will absolutely love it. I should add actually when we did the did the TV show, we kind of went off this sort of beating track a bit. So as much as the Tudus stuff we were privy to, we were really lucky because we wanted to kind of unearth some really interesting stories and people as part of the program. We saw a slightly different side to Japan than we see, you know, in tourist brochures and things like that.

And for me, this film is the closest I've come to being back in Japan in terms of the real people and places that it's shown me.

Hikari is wonderful. I just loved being in her company. She's got this enthusiasm that kind of exudes every pore of her body.

And it kind of just hypnotises you in a way and it makes you smile.

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