On the other, there’s a great deal of trepidation about how best to negotiate the difficult decisions concerning what to do next with the two kids. On one hand, he guiltily feels a sense of validation that the underachieving Keita wasn’t really his boy.

It’s a shocking development for all involved, but for Ryota it also creates a strange dichotomy of emotions.

That lesson comes in an unexpected form, however: The hospital that delivered Keita reveals that they accidentally gave them the wrong boy, and that their child has been living with a working-class family led by parents Maki Yoko and Lily Franky. Because of their lush condo’s sterile environment and Ryota’s haughty demeanor, we sense that this is a man who needs to understand that making money isn’t everything. The film stars actor (and Japanese pop star) Fukuyama Masaharu as Ryota, who lives with his wife Midori (Ono Machiko) in a posh high-rise with their 6-year-old son, Keita. We probably don’t need another film about a workaholic father who learns to stop and smell the roses, but when it’s handled as effortlessly as Kore-eda does here, you remember that storytelling conventions exist for a reason: In the right hands, they can still work wonderfully.

Like Father, Like Son, the latest bittersweet drama from Japanese writer-director Kore-eda Hirokazu, may be utterly conventional in some ways, but its surging emotional power eventually proves too overwhelming to deny.

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