The Silent Resonance of the Woods: Hamaguchi Ryusuke’s Evil Does Not Exist

In the landscape of contemporary cinema, few directors possess the architectural precision and emotional depth of Hamaguchi Ryusuke. Following the global acclaim of Drive My Car (2021), which earned him an Academy Award and solidified his reputation as a master of the long-form drama, Hamaguchi has returned with a work that feels both like a departure and an inevitable evolution. Evil Does Not Exist, his latest feature, is a haunting, atmospheric exploration of the friction between corporate convenience and the immutable rhythms of the natural world.

Winner of the Grand Jury Prize at the 2023 Venice Film Festival, the film serves as a somber companion piece to Gift, a silent film commissioned by multi-instrumentalist Ishibashi Eiko. Together, these works form a unique dialogue between sound and image, exploring the fragility of ecosystems and the human ignorance that threatens them.

The Genesis of an Eco-Fable: From Gift to the Big Screen

The origin of Evil Does Not Exist is rooted in an unexpected creative prompt. In late 2021, seeking a reprieve from the exhaustive cycle of international film festivals, Hamaguchi was approached by his longtime collaborator, Ishibashi Eiko, to provide visuals for her live concert performances. The result was Gift, an ambitious 75-to-90-minute silent film.

"I had no idea how I would make something for a live performance," Hamaguchi admits. "My starting point was the fact that I wouldn’t have to create any sound. Then I realized Eiko was giving me the freedom to do whatever I wanted."

As he began writing the script, the narrative scope expanded well beyond the requirements of the concert film. When Hamaguchi began shooting, he found the voices of his actors so compelling that he felt a duty to showcase them in a standalone narrative. With Ishibashi’s blessing, he embarked on the production of Evil Does Not Exist, weaving the raw material of the initial project into a broader, more contemplative feature.

Chronology of a Crisis: The Incursion of Urban Ambition

The narrative of Evil Does Not Exist is deceptive in its simplicity. Set in the fictional village of Mizubiki—a composite location inspired by the rugged border regions of Yamanashi and Nagano prefectures—the story follows Takumi (played by Hitoshi Omika), a local handyman whose existence is tethered to the forest.

The timeline of the film’s central conflict is triggered by the arrival of two representatives from a Tokyo-based talent agency. Tasked with organizing a town-hall meeting, these urban outsiders arrive to propose a "glamping" site—a luxury camping venture designed to offer city dwellers a curated, commodified experience of nature.

The chronology of the disruption unfolds as follows:

• The Preliminary Assessment: The agency employees, Takahashi and Mayazumi, visit Mizubiki to survey the land, displaying a profound lack of understanding regarding the local water table and the environmental impact of their construction.
• The Town Hall Meeting: The film’s centerpiece, a town-hall debate, captures the stark divide between local wisdom and corporate ignorance. Residents, intimately familiar with the flow of spring water and the delicate balance of their forest, dismantle the project’s viability with surgical precision.
• The Turning Point: As the tension escalates, the agency representatives find their own perspectives challenged. The "sloping" logic of their project is met with the blunt, physical reality of the villagers’ lives.
• The Unraveling: The film moves toward an ambiguous, harrowing conclusion that forces the audience to reconsider the "evil" referenced in the title—not as a personified force, but as a byproduct of human indifference.

Supporting Data: Crafting the Aesthetic of Indifference

Hamaguchi’s approach to Evil Does Not Exist relies heavily on the "patient gaze." Cinematographer Kitagawa Yoshio utilizes long, static takes and slow tracking shots to frame the landscape not as a passive background, but as a living entity.

A critical element in the film’s success is the casting of Hitoshi Omika. Originally a crew member on Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy, Omika was not a professional actor. However, while driving Hamaguchi and Kitagawa through the region during pre-production, Omika’s presence struck the director.

"Simply by looking at his face, it makes people wonder, ‘What is he thinking?’" Hamaguchi notes. By employing his signature rehearsal method—where actors read their lines with a flat, emotionless delivery until the cadence becomes second nature—Hamaguchi stripped away the artifice of performance, allowing Omika to embody the role through presence rather than affectation.

The film’s score, composed by Ishibashi Eiko, acts as an additional character. The "plangent" music, played fortissimo over the opening tracking shots of the forest canopy, sets a tone of "awe, fragility, and horror." It serves as an sonic reminder that the forest exists outside of human understanding, indifferent to the commercial schemes of the city-dwellers.

Official Responses and Director’s Intent: The "Glamping" Critique

In discussions surrounding the film, Hamaguchi has been careful to clarify his stance on the industry he depicts. While the "glamping" project in the film is presented as absurd and ultimately destructive, Hamaguchi insists that his goal was not to mock the industry, but to examine the disconnect between the urban and the rural.

"I’m not trying to induce laughter," he says, "but I was certainly laughing in my head whenever I thought about the folly of their project."

Hamaguchi highlights the irony of "glamping": it is a commercial attempt to extract the beauty of nature while "shaving off what is inconvenient." He contrasts this with the authentic labor he observed during his research—chopping wood, hauling ten-kilogram tanks of spring water, and learning the intricate ways a community survives in concert with its environment. His own experience of these physical tasks, which he describes as "memorable" and filled with the "nervous tension" of potential failure, provided the grounded perspective necessary to write the screenplay.

Implications: The Nature of Evil in the Anthropocene

The ultimate implication of Evil Does Not Exist is that "evil" is not necessarily a malicious act, but rather a lack of consideration. By juxtaposing the "sloppy plans" of the agency employees with the precise, ancestral knowledge of the villagers, Hamaguchi creates a mirror for the audience.

For the urban viewer, the film serves as a subtle indictment of the "distance" between modern living and the natural world. Hamaguchi admits that as a city dweller, he felt this distance himself during production. The film does not offer a moralistic conclusion, nor does it paint the corporate employees as mustache-twirling villains. Instead, it suggests that the real danger lies in the failure of imagination—the inability to see the forest as anything other than a resource or a vacation spot.

By incorporating a child into a prominent role—a departure for Hamaguchi—he captures a level of "authenticity that adults feel restricted from exhibiting." Through the eyes of the child and the stoic, animalistic silence of Takumi, the film suggests that the forest is a space of freedom that remains fundamentally alien to those who treat it with the transactional arrogance of a business proposal.

As the final notes of Ishibashi’s score fade, the audience is left with a lingering, unsettling question: how do we inhabit a world that we have spent so long trying to simplify? Through his meticulous direction and refusal to provide easy answers, Hamaguchi Ryusuke has crafted a cinematic experience that is as enduring as the trees that loom over the characters of Mizubiki. Evil Does Not Exist is a reminder that while humanity may attempt to reshape the earth to fit its desires, nature possesses a "spirit of change" that will ultimately endure, indifferent to our presence.