I was totally surprised at how great this film.You could feel your paranoia rise as the film went on and as you gradually learned the details of the real situation.

The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

It is encouraging that the film ends so strongly.Otherwise, it wouldn't have been a particularly memorable film

I really did enjoy this movie. I did but...This movie followed one of the more popular themes in the Japanese movies I've seen: loneliness and unfulfillment/inadequacy. But it wasn't as deep. Sometimes I felt like I didn't even know what the characters were feeling or even why. Something was missing.The thing about this movie that bothered me was that there were just so many missed opportunities to really reach home (I don't really know how else to say it.) The movie brings in many minor characters, all of which Nozomi has brief encounters with, to show you their loneliness. But why? Why show these extremely underdeveloped characters who we know near nothing about? Maybe if they had delved deeper in to their lives by increasing their interactions with Nozomi or by having them have "actual" interactions with her(like they had done with the one of the minor characters).Nozomi also seemed a bit "flat" to me. Maybe this was on purpose? Either way, I wanted to see her grow more. She had gained a heart and she did not seem to have used it much. It was as if she was only half alive. She never cried, screamed or expressed any other emotions sans sadness, child like joy/wonder and there is more than that to being human. If they wanted viewers to understand/feel the loneliness that the characters were experiencing they should have built up the story more. Like was there even a climax?Nevertheless, this was a good movie! If you are thinking of watching this please do! It was a cute and sad story.

I'm now a fully dedicated fan to the work of Hirokazu Koreeda. His films are endlessly lovable. Taking on strange ideas but presenting them with most earnestness. Here he does Toy Story/Pinocchio with a blow-up sex doll. She comes to life after her lonely owner leaves for work. She ventures around meeting people and begins to understand the world around her. She longs for a heart but soon finds with a heart comes great pain. This film is a realistic fantasy. Never once do we doubt the story that is being told. It deals with the objectification of women, and the loneliness of humanity. Koreeda never allows us to wallow in self-pity. He presents a montage of lonely characters which is absolutely crushing. He doesn't use cheap techniques, just showing people in their lives. Picking shell out of a cracked egg, dealing with picky customers, overhearing somebody else being chatted up. It's all done with such honesty you soon forget this is a story about a sex doll. Du-na Bae creates a fish out of water character looking for her purpose and happiness, without coming across as stupid or annoying. Her innocence drives the film and makes it all the more tragic. A wonderful piece.

Youth culture today is much like it was several generations ago in the early 20th century with one significant difference. We live in a more sexually relaxed society today, which is ironically less promiscuous than it was for young adults in the 60's, 70's, and 80's. Indeed, a higher percentage of children today reach their 19th and even 20th birthdays with their virginity than their parents did. It isn't uncommon, if you speak to this minority of young people, to hear outlandish, fantastical, or absurd descriptions of their ideal boyfriend/girlfriend or first sexual encounter. Childhood exposure to "sweet romance" films linger unhealthily and sabotage these older virgins. This is especially true in Japan, where depopulation is a serious social issue.Hirokazu Koreeda's Air Doll is a film about this phenomenon, or I interpret it as one. Unfortunately, any review you read is going to be jaded by the film's abyss of ambiguity. A few of the director's intentions are identifiable, but a lot of it features the titular doll wandering about and experiencing her new human life. These segments are well-filmed and emotionally grounded in a generic childhood discovery theme, lacking the more interesting focal points of the director's other films. The viewer is thus left to apply cultural implications to the film for it to be more than pure cinema.The air doll is an inflatable sex toy owned by a middle-aged man who calls her Nozomi and treats her as his girlfriend. They eat dinner together, walk through the park, and have sex all on his schedule, and he loves her a lot. Nozomi "realizes (she) has a heart" and wakes up one day when her master goes to work. She wanders around for a while, taking everything in, and visits a movie store. She begins working there and falls in love with one of her coworkers. More wonder sequences play, this time featuring the pair's almost-dialog free courtship. On paper it sounds mundane, but lead actress Bae Doona bolsters the emotionality of these scenes with her performance which is reminiscent of a Disney Princess role minus the artificial sentiment. The camera frequently grants us a close ups of her and her boyfriend, encouraging our intimacy with their romance.Koreeda overtly references Disney's version of The Little Mermaid, specifically in Nozomi's observation of a girl who mistakes a fork for a comb. The girl's father tells her that a fork isn't for grooming, which becomes entwined with the narrative when Nozomi punctures herself. Her boyfriend "blows life into her" through her air hole, an indirect form of sexual expression, but Nozomi doesn't understand its implications. This reaffirms the latent misogyny of the many Disney films, where the woman character subtly confuses her psychological needs with those of society and her prince. A perfect conclusion follows: Nozomi stabs her boyfriend in his navel to breathe into him, and he bleeds to death. Her desire for mutual intimacy cannot be realized, and she suffers for it. In her grief, she throws herself in a trash heap.Perhaps Air Doll can thus be seen as an encompassing metaphor for coming social collapse brought about by youth's (Japanese or otherwise) alienation from itself. Beyond the birth rate decline, people are more likely to encourage their perversions when they are entirely alone. Watching contrived romantic films only worsens an already vulnerable populace's efforts to get what it wants, at some level.Recommended

Doo-na Bae, who I saw less than two weeks ago in "Spring Bears Love", now stars as a life size blow up doll come to like. As Nozomi, she lives with a middle aged man (before she comes to life), where he speaks to her, dresses her in various outfits and even makes love to her. When she comes alive, she wanders out into a video store where she meets the clerk Junichi, and begins to work there, also quickly growing very fond of him. As Nozomi, Doo-na Bae, who is prettier now than when she was in "Spring Bears Love", delivers a wonderful, affecting performance. Its a role that is not easy to play, you have to first accept that she came to life. As a love story, it borders on moving. The premise sounds like it could be a tawdry film, but it really isn't. Its a bold idea as a serious film and it works. I recommend it.