Review: ‘Air Doll’ tracks a sex doll’s existential crisis

Hirokazu Kore-eda’s Air Doll made a cannonball splash more than decade ago. Initially, the fantasy film only saw a wide release in its native country of Japan, receiving outstanding reviews on the festival circuit. That was 2009. Now, it is finally seeing the light of day in the United States with a VOD release, following a brief and limited theatrical run. And it’s well worth the wait. With Sense8 star Bae Doona at its posh, pastel, and poetic center, the feature mines the human condition, particularly our collective yearning for connection, lustful desires, and loneliness.

The film follows a man named Hideo (Itsuji Itao), a weary, down-on-his-luck waiter looking for love in all the wrong places. When he receives his shiny new sex doll in the mail, he names her Nozomi, brought to life with Doona’s quiet but commanding performance. Hideo does everything with Nozomi. He dresses her. Gabs to her over dinner about his work day. And then has sex with her. While he’s away, Nozomi awakens and begins her own journey through life, first wandering aimlessly down the street and later actually getting a job at a local video store. It’s as absurd as it sounds, yet it soon unravels a heartfelt depiction of what it means to barely survive. Life passes like sands in an hourglass, and Nozomi learns some of life’s toughest lessons.

“It seems life is constructed in a way that no one can fulfill it alone,” a video store co-worker muses. It’s within their deepest, most enlightened conversation that Nozomi begins to understand human existence. Her role is far more than being one lonely gentlemen’s play thing. She has ambitions and drive and a growing sense of agency, soon gulping down the air and the world around her. As she gains experience, and along with it joy, invigoration, and compassion, she is dealt a deadly dose of pain. “Having a heart was heartbreaking,” she says, wistfully overlooking the surrounding bay.

And that one line captures the film’s entire scope. Air Doll is a tenderly crackling slow-burn, a drama bursting with a gooey fantasy center. We’re not too far removed from such a future, one in which human beings are further cut off from one another with only lifeless toys and gadgets to keep us company. If having a heart wasn’t already heartbreaking enough, one day soon it will surely crush us to death.

Air Doll is now available on VOD.

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