Film at Lincoln Center presents “Hamaguchi I & II,” a selected retrospective of Ryûsuke Hamaguchi’s films to be presented at FLC from April 26–30, in anticipation of the North American Premiere of GIFT (May 1–2 at FLC with composer Eiko Ishibashi performing a live score in person), and the U.S. release of his NYFF61 Main Slate selection Evil Does Not Exist (opening May 3 at FLC with Hamaguchi and Ishibashi in person).

Evil Does Not Exist opens at FLC on May 3–get tickets!

Film at Lincoln Center has been instrumental in introducing audiences to Hamaguchi’s work, beginning with the New York debut of Happy Hour in 2016 at New Directors/New Films. Since then, four of his features have made their U.S. premiere at the New York Film Festival: Drive My Car (NYFF59), Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy (NYFF59), Asako I & II (NYFF56), and Evil Does Not Exist (NYFF61). Passion, Hamaguchi’s 2008 theatrical debut, premiered in the U.S. in an FLC theatrical run in 2023.

Since emerging onto the world stage with his 2015 international breakthrough, the five-plus-hour Happy Hour, Ryûsuke Hamaguchi has hardly slowed down. Rather, the six additional films he has made since then have all but solidified his status as one of contemporary cinema’s most tirelessly inventive filmmakers, whose body of work so far is among the most profoundly human, richly cinematic, and pleasantly unpredictable in modern movies. Over the years he has developed a style evoking the fiction-gamesmanship of Rivette, the unassuming intimacy of Rohmer, and the expressive formalism of Sōmai with the distinctive traits of Hollywood and literature that—in a rarely successful balancing act—have won over arthouse and mainstream crowds alike. From his short films and debut feature Passion, made while still a student, to the 2021 double-hitter of Wheel of Fortune and Fantasy and Oscar winner Drive My Car, “Hamaguchi I & II,” offers the opportunity to see some of the director’s most remarkable films.

Organized by Florence Almozini and Tyler Wilson.