Sheep in the Box

Set in the near future, Sheep in the Box poses profound and disturbing questions about what will constitute family and human connection not too long from now. Grieving their young son who died in mysterious circumstances, Otone and her husband Kensuke turn to REbirth, a company assisting the bereaved by allowing them to spend more time with their loved ones. Using AI-generated robotics, the company supplies the parents with a state-of-the-art humanoid replication of their lost son, Kakeru. Initially, the humanoid is barely communicative, able only to say ''I'm home.'' Kensuke dismissively refers to it as a ''Tamagotchi'' or a ''Roomba''. But rapidly, the humanoid develops and appears to have memories it couldn't possibly have, and Otone and Kensuke are perplexed to find themselves drawn closer and closer to what appears more and more to be their son. But with the closeness comes parental pressure, and in the town a group of children are gathering new recruits for a mysterious mission. Kore-eda, the brilliant director of children as in Nobody Knows, Broker and Monster, draws terrific performances from the child actors in this thought-provoking drama about the future of grief, human relations and parenting.