As they inch into their 30s and the excitements of youth stop feeling so exciting, the three characters at the center of writer-director Hashiguchi Ryosuke's Hush! start searching for that mysterious something else that will make it all worthwhile. Tired of flitting from his tiny, toy-filled apartment to his pet-store job to the gay-bar circuit, Takahashi Kazuya meets a nice, quiet man (Tanabe Seiichi) and, after a tentative beginning, starts to settle down. For Tanabe, however, there's more to life than simple couplehood, and when a tomboyish, child-seeking actress-turned-dental-hygienist (Kataoka Reiko) proposes that Tanabe become a surrogate father, he quickly becomes intrigued by the possibility. Can this group somehow form a family? Hush! takes an excessive, saga-like running time to reach its conclusion, but Hashiguchi frequently makes the trudge worthwhile, particularly when he finds the energy to match his three leads' charming performances. As they come closer to a decision, they see echoes of their dilemma everywhere. Takahashi watches with revulsion as his boss goes about breeding dogs with a bit too much enthusiasm. A visit to his brother and shrill sister-in-law reminds Tanabe that family can be as much a burden as a blessing. An obsessive, ultra-feminine rival with a crush on Tanabe mocks Kataoka's unusual courtship. Throughout, Hashiguchi displays a real knack for comedic insight, and if only that titular exclamation mark didn't seem so perversely misapplied, Hush! would go down much more easily. It's virtually Hashiguchi's birthright as a Japanese filmmaker to let Hush! play out in long, formally composed takes, but the approach keeps undermining the film's best qualities, nudging the balance between deadpan comedy and studied family drama too far in one direction. Even when the drag starts to overwhelm, the film still scrapes by thanks to winning characters who find the kernel of optimism that allows one generation to hope for the best as it produces another. For Hashiguchi, that seems as satisfying a definition of family as any other. Though his film takes its time, there's an admirable audaciousness to its suggestion that the answer to the time-honored debate about personal desires and familial obligation at the center of so many Japanese films may rest at the business end of a turkey baster.