The Witches of the Orient
Kimstim Films | Release Date: July 9, 2021 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
74
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 6 Critic Reviews
Positive:
5
Mixed:
1
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
80
Los Angeles TimesRobert AbeleJul 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
80
The GuardianPhuong LeJul 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
80
The New York TimesTeo BugbeeJul 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
78
Austin ChronicleJosh KupeckiJul 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
75
Slant MagazineMark HansonJul 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
60
VarietyJessica KiangJul 8, 2021
For all the film’s playful artistry, the effect is more scattershot. Read full review
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