So as the movie starts, there’s this three-generation family living on the margins of society — the opening scene is of the dad and son coordinating some shoplifting. A little girl runs away from home; she’s been abused, so they can’t bear to take her back to her parents, and end up keeping her. And so the movie basically follows the daily life of this little family — a trip to the beach, regular household interactions, job woes, and yeah, some shoplifting.

And then… the boy gets caught shoplifting, and everything unravels. Here the movie starts to feel a lot like a Japanese version of Leave No Trace, as the authorities come into it and discover how irregular everything has been, and set to work making it normal. And as in that movie, okay, yeah, most of this needs to be done — kids really do need to go to school, and raising them to be little thieves is not really a good alternative — but along with the necessary and good stuff, it’s sort of destroying a family, too. There are revelations about what the relationships between all these characters are, but as much as the police and social services are shedding new light on things, they’re also misunderstanding and just plain missing a lot of the less tangible aspects of the relationships, too.

It’s a good movie about what it means to be family, with fascinating and subtly drawn characters. Also, at no point does Emperor Palpatine appear. Recommended.