Sightlines · reception

How The Love Witch was received

2016 · Anna Biller · The Love Witch on Sightlines

The arc

A critical darling on arrival in 2016, it's since graduated from arthouse curio to perennial — every October it climbs the Letterboxd charts as part of the unofficial 'witch autumn' rewatch canon.

What’s debated

The eternal debate: is it camp to laugh with, or sincere feminist melodrama that audiences keep misreading — a tension Anna Biller herself has publicly pushed back on, insisting the film isn't a parody or a 'so bad it's good' midnight movie.

Its footprint

'According to the experts, men are very fragile' became a Letterboxd-review and Film Twitter staple, and the film's saturated Technicolor look — Elaine's eyeshadow, the tearoom, the pentagram rug — is endlessly screenshotted as a moodboard aesthetic.

Where it stands

A modern cult object and Letterboxd favorite — the go-to proof that pastiche can be auteurism, and a 'you must have seen this' for anyone into witchy cinema.

Did you know? Anna Biller spent years making nearly everything herself — writing, directing, editing, scoring, and hand-crafting the costumes and props, including hand-hooking the pentagram rug, which alone took her about six months.

Named by the director

• Douglas Sirk — Biller cited Sirk's Technicolor melodramas as a key touchstone for the film's heightened emotional register and look.
• Alfred Hitchcock — Biller named Hitchcock's 1960s color films as an influence on the film's studio-era visual style.