New film by Ryusuke Hamaguchi: “Evil does not exist” in the cinema: The devils from the city

Yoshio Kitagawa’s camera is aimed skyward. There the treetops dance to the rhythm of the wind – and to the spherical music of Eiko Ishibashi. It stays that way for the entire 106 minutes – except for the disturbances in this idyll of (moderate) wind, trees and the (few) people here who chop wood and cook with pure spring water. The disruptions always come from outside, or more precisely: from the not far away city of Tokyo.

City dwellers are sick, perhaps even evil representatives of the human species, while country dwellers are healthy (see cooking with pure spring water), wise and good, because they maintain tradition, plants and animals. It’s strange how a religiously celebrated ecologism tries to revise the claim of reason that led to the cry in the 13th century: “City air sets you free!” However, it is undisputed that this air was quite poisonous at a time of unbridled industrialization. Now what follows from this? “Back to nature” as a program of forced deindustrialization?

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One has the impression that director Ryusuke Hamaguchi has brought his Rousseau reading into flowing images here, or is it the Japanese version of Henry David Thoreau’s “Walden” that we are witnessing? Nothing against slow images and the magic of simple things, like an inconspicuous plant on the forest floor that you have to know so that it speaks to you.

But when what is shown takes on something intentionally didactic, when meditation looks like a meditation workshop, then the (undoubtedly important) cultural-critical approach becomes ideological again. The fight between city and country if understood as the fight of evil against good – that would be such a case of ideology, which is a dangerously false consciousness.

Hamaguchi doesn’t seem free from such messianism either. In the end, magic replaces the boring interest in profit, which is not progress. “Evil Does Not Exist” is also a misleading title, because one big exorcism is being carried out here. And the slow images are not the powerful, self-contained images of Andrei Tarkovsky that he confronts us with in his mysterious apocalyptic story “Stalker,” but rather appear designed. So is the nature that is so transfigured here just an industrial product?

Hamaguchi’s forest epic was shown at the Venice Film Festival last year and at least won a Silver Lion. And two years ago, his existentialistically austere film “Drive My Car” even won an Oscar. So he must have mastered his profession? Yes, he knows how to do it, perhaps even too well, when he makes eco-apocalyptic films like this one, which also has something of the product character that he wants to castigate as a neoliberal fall from grace.

There is the strange word “forest bathing”, also advertised as wellness for the soul. This affects both the film’s gesture of transfiguring nature and the principle denounced here of marketing the idyll profitably. With »Evil Does Not Exist« Hamaguchi serves both sides: that of the shallow wellness industry with its sentimental idea of ​​nature and that of its critics. If that’s not a feat!

That’s what it’s about: A “glamping” company wants to convert the natural idyll into a profitable resort. The neoliberal word mix sells camping on a glamorous level – a wellness product for people who usually only live in five-star hotels, but now have the need for nature and peace without wanting to forego the luxury they are used to. A business idea that promises high profits.

Two representatives from the industry come to the village to promote the project. And this scene in the film, which lasts perhaps half an hour, is worth watching and shows that Hamaguchi can not only indulge in images, but can also stage dramatic arguments – in a minimalist way. This one long scene is anything but long-winded. Because now the two glamping representatives, a young man and a young woman with the obligatory computer and advertising film, are sitting quite helplessly in front of the village assembly and are supposed to convince them that what they are planning is all well and good.

But both run into a wall of rejection. They hear that the planned sewage treatment tank is too small and is in the wrong place in the plans. But 90 percent of the wastewater is treated this way! But the remaining ten percent of dirt ruined the pure spring water for which the area is famous. It’s an unequal exchange of blows. Because the villagers, quite a few of them also dropouts from the urban environment, know exactly what they were looking for and what they found here, and they always have the better arguments. Once the ecological balance is disturbed, the noble “glamping” only brings garbage into the forest.

The two “glamping” representatives, who are already having strong doubts, drive back to Tokyo and convey the concerns they have heard. Their bosses replied that they shouldn’t be so hesitant; it’s important not to lose sight of the time factor as a competitive advantage. You need to go back immediately and deliver results. No matter how.

The ending is then deliberately mysterious. One of the representatives hangs on to Takumi, the spokesman for the village opposition, supposedly in order to understand everything here better and to learn from him. Numerous bows follow; the Japanese are still polite even when there is a fight to the death. And suddenly Takumi’s daughter Hana disappears. Actually, you don’t have to worry about the eight-year-old, she often goes into hiding in the forest and knows her way around. But this time it’s different. A roebuck has been shot by strangers and is standing directly opposite the girl in a clearing. But the way they both look into each other’s eyes, the girl and the dying deer, you know it won’t hurt her. Their common enemy is somewhere else.

Well, that was to be expected – but the “glamping” representative, who is also a human being, especially a hesitant one, will have to pay for it.

»Evil does not exist«: Japan 2023. Regie und Buch: Ryusuke Hamaguchi. Mit: Hitoshi Omika, Ryo Nishikawa, Ryuji Kosaka, Ayaka Shibutani. 106 Min. Kinostart: 18. April.

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