‘Evil Does Not Exist’: A battle for the soul of a Japanese mountain village

That chilliness is appropriate for the subject matter. This is an angry film about the potential desecration of nature by a giant, soulless Tokyo conglomerate called Playmode. The company wants to build a “glamping” (short for “glamorous camping”) resort in the idyllic country town of Mizubiki Village. The resort will draw tourists to an easily managed facsimile of an environment nature already provides, supplementing God’s work with an inferior copy built by man. Writer-director Ryusuke Hamaguchi follows up his Oscar-winning film “Drive My Car” with the more somber and meditative...