Julien Faraut - Symphony of a Sports Team
In this episode of HOBO, French director Julien Faraut discusses with us his sparkling documentary about the volleyball team that inspired a whole raft of manga characters.
The former players of the Japanese women’s volleyball team used to be known as the ‘Witches of the Orient’ because of their seemingly supernatural powers on the courts.
In this episode of HOBO, French director Julien Faraut discusses with us his sparkling documentary about the volleyball team that inspired a whole raft of manga characters and anime series.
In Witches of the Orient, the formation of the squad in the late 1950s as a worker’s team at a textile factory, right up until their triumph at the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo, their memories and stern discipline are evoked through modern-day sequences, archival footage, and cartoon images where fact and fable fly hand in hand.
It makes use of fantastic animated sequences, such as Attack no 1 (1968), mixed with footage of blood-curdling matches and extreme training sessions, driven by rhythmic editing and music from French musician K-Raw.
The sixth episode of HOBO is out now.