The Witches of the Orient

Name: The Witches of the Orient
Genre: Sport, Documentary
Released: July 9, 2021
Duration: 100 min
Rating: 74
Cast: Emiko Miyamoto, Hirofumi Daimatsu, Katsumi Matsumura, Masae Kasai, Maseko Kondo

2021

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Generally favorable reviews based on 6 Critic Reviews

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Movie Details & Credits

Kimstim Films | Release Date: July 9, 2021 | Not Rated

Starring: Emiko Miyamoto, Hirofumi Daimatsu, Katsumi Matsumura, Masae Kasai, Maseko Kondo, Sata Isobe, Setsuko Sasaki, Yoshiko Matsumura, Yuko Fujimoto, Yuriko Handa

Summary: How does a Japanese women’s volleyball team from the late 1950s become an international sensation, feminist role models, the subject of a wildly popular comic book, and a still-influential anime? This stranger-than-fiction story is dynamically told by Julien Faraut (John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection), with an ironic twist on theHow does a Japanese women’s volleyball team from the late 1950s become an international sensation, feminist role models, the subject of a wildly popular comic book, and a still-influential anime? This stranger-than-fiction story is dynamically told by Julien Faraut (John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection), with an ironic twist on the original demeaning moniker, Oriental Witches. A group of Osaka textile workers is transformed into a fiercely competitive volleyball team by their astonishingly ruthless coach whose unconventional techniques emphasize speed and aggression. A record-setting winning streak and a dramatic 1964 Tokyo Olympics triumph follow. Wonderful archival footage of the women in training and on the court, animated versions of their championship games, and moving interviews with the women today are set to a pulsating electronic score. [Film Forum]… Expand

Director: Julien Faraut

Genre(s): Sport, Documentary

Rating: Not Rated

Runtime: 100 min

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Critic Reviews

Robert Abele

Jul 15, 2021

Fusing exquisitely shot color 16mm footage from 1964 of the team’s training sessions, drone-like music and splices of animation, we get a delirious sense of what these committed women endured six out of seven days a week. Read full review

Teo Bugbee

Jul 8, 2021

If the team was derided by their prejudiced (and defeated) foes in the moment of their success, this documentary elegantly restores the glow of legend, saving the champions the trouble of having to explain their heroism in words. Read full review

The Guardian Phuong Le

Jul 13, 2021

By pairing real-life events with their animated interpretations, the film not only offers a fresh approach to documentary style but also draws out the tension between reality and artifice, private and public memory. Read full review

Josh Kupecki

Jul 14, 2021

As he did with his previous doc, 2018’s John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection, Faraut finds and obsesses over the rhythm of bodies in motion, using repetition and cross-cuts of the team’s training footage and gameplay with anime sequences and textile manufacturing. These collisions, set to music from Portishead and Grandaddy’s Jason Lytle, are the heart of Witches, hypnotic patterns of serene velocity. Read full review

Mark Hanson

Jul 6, 2021

The film’s fanciful archival montages shrewdly demonstrate the ways in which memory and art seamlessly combine to document reality. Read full review

Jessica Kiang

Jul 8, 2021

For all the film’s playful artistry, the effect is more scattershot. Read full review

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