Takumi (Hitoshi Omika) and his eight-year-old daughter Hana (Ryo Nishikawa) live in a forested region of Japan, an unspoiled bucolic idyll unthreatened by urban development, that is until a pair of slick marketing agents come to the village to propose the building of a glamping site for holidaymakers in search of a sanitised up-scale alternative to actual camping. At a public hearing, the locals critique the numerous flaws in the project, from lack of security to the location of the septic tank, all of which will have serious negative consequences for the villagers. With this enigmatic fable, Hamaguchi, following from Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy and Drive my Car, which won the Best International Feature Oscar in 2022, solidifies his reputation as one of world cinema’s most exciting and unpredictable practitioners.

Notes by David O’Mahony