Almost deceptively, Ryusuke Hamaguchi’s latest film initially comes across as a conventional story about a big, bad corporation invading a rustic village for profit. The simplicity of the premise is what works for me, since I love stories that explain in detail situations involving labor and commerce. Here we have a Tokyo talent agency exploiting COVID-related government subsidies to set up a rental campsite for rich Tokyoites in the mountains of Yamanashi, where the locals live in relative harmony with the land. As part of the subsidy deal the company has to gain the trust of these locals, who don’t go for the plan at all. For the most part, the plot development is unexceptional though punctuated by several dialogue-driven set pieces that prove Hamaguchi’s genius in creating tension through character interaction. Compared to Hamaguchi’s previous work, it’s forthrightly entertaining—that is, until the very end, when it goes bonkers in a way that would be impossible to describe even if I wanted to.

The “evil” referred to in the title does not exist in nature, whose relationship to humankind has no Manichean dimension. It just is, and whatever trouble humans cause for nature or vice versa is relative and, for what it’s worth, “natural.” The village handyman, Takumi (Hitoshi Omika), understands this relationship, and you can intuit his unvoiced resentment of the company’s two representatives, the veteran factotum, Takahashi (Ryuji Kosaka), and the conflicted novice, Mayuzumi (Ayaka Shibutani), in the way he rejects their offer of employment in the glamping enterprise. But just because Takumi identifies strongly with the natural world doesn’t mean he doesn’t harbor destructive impulses. One of the mysteries that Hamaguchi plays up in the film is the absence of Takumi’s wife, since he is raising his 8-year-old daughter, Hana (Ryo Nishikawa), by himself, teaching her how to address nature, which he sees as being red in tooth and claw. In contrast, the scenes in Tokyo at the talent agency virtually drip with mercenary bad faith, a kind of sickness that Takahashi and Mayuzumi sense after incurring the wrath of the villagers during their presentation and then, unwittingly, bringing that sickness back to the village on a subsequent revisit to secure the locals’ permission at their boss’s patronizing insistence. They choose Takumi as their means of delivery without realizing that their good intentions are anything but. 

Hamaguchi’s purposes are aided considerably by Eiko Ishibashi’s haunting score, which tends to be used only in those dream-like scenes that take place in the woods, whereas the scenes set in so-called civilization move to a kind of dull utilitarian rhythm. It’s a contrast that Hamaguchi works up in a subliminal way, so that the turn of events is even more of a shock. It would be petty to accuse the director of trying to manipulate the viewer’s feelings, but after seeing it twice—the second time paying close attention to any clues that plumb Takumi’s personality—I still find it weird and scary. Don’t go into the forest unless you’re prepared for something you would never expect.

In Japanese. Now playing in Tokyo at Bunkamura Le Cinema Shibuya Miyashita (050-6875-5280).

Evil Does Not Exist home page in Japanese

photo (c) 2023 NEOPA/Fictive