In our November women's sport documentary screening we cast our minds back to the first Olympic Games hosted by Tokyo, in 1964, in which volleyball made its debut as part of the global sports bonanza. Taking out Gold in the women's final was a team of homegrown heroes, former textile factory workers whose victory was the highpoint of an unprecedented – near supernatural – winning streak of 258 matches.

This team, ungraciously dubbed 'the witches of the Orient' by the foreign press, is the subject of Julien Faraut's idiosyncratic documentary, which finds the filmmaker crafting a similarly philosophical, immersive portrait of these elite athletes as in his first, much lauded feature, John McEnroe: In the Realm of Perfection (2018).

In time with the thrumming electronic score, Faraut intercuts footage of gameplay and punishing training sessions with that of the women working in the factory and bursts of anime (pinched from Attack No 1, the most popular of the volleyball-themed series inspired by the team's success) to bewitching effect.

Run time: 1:33