Reviews & Quotes | ONLOOKERS

The New York Times | Alissa Wilkinson
“I also loved ONLOOKERS, Kimi Takesue’s unusual film about tourism in Laos…here we are as viewers, watching people be watched. So who is the real onlooker?”

Yale University | Marc Francis
“ONLOOKERS follows in the traditions of observational documentary and slow cinema, and by uniting the two, offers a unique meditation on the quotidian frictions between local and tourist life in Laos. Takesue brings equal amounts of curiosity, wit, heart, and critique to her visually wondrous documentary.”

Film Comment | Michael Sicinski
"Revelatory…Onlookers provides a piercing and ironic examination of seemingly benevolent cultural consumption... A wry and at times uproarious ethnographic work."

Film Threat | Benjamin Franz
"If you’re looking for a new kind of travel film, this is for you."

Filmmaker Magazine | A.E. Hunt
"A surprisingly funny observational documentary ...she's not merely reversing too-common gazes or commenting on tourism's cannibalization of a place...Onlookers is instead the pithy result of her long look at a place and its tourism from untrodden angles. She is able to look at travel critically as well as see its potential."

Hyperallergic | Eileen G’Sell
"Immersive, beguiling and productively unsettling...the film is an exercise in the power of watching and listening.”

Asian Arts Alliance, The AMP | Delaney Chieyen Holton
“Takesue’s unnarrated durational engagement lets each moment unfold in its full complexity, softening and rehumanizing the critical eye of the viewer, who might otherwise mistake themselves as apart from and above the tourists on screen.”

Truth Dig | Edward Frumkin
"The scenes appear as motion postcards sedately unspooling life's minutiae...“Onlookers” peels back the layers of commodified culture to reveal the deep and enduring pleasures of travel."

Cinema Daily | Mako Fukata
“A profound exploration of the transformative power of embracing the unfamiliar and finding beauty in the ordinary, wherever one may be.”

Reverse Shot | Natalia Keogan
“[Takesue’s] films argue that our ability to patiently observe is all that stands in the way of personal enlightenment and cross-cultural connection.”

Prismatic Ground, Brooklyn Academy of Music | Inney Prakash
“Through a series of expertly framed static takes (and meticulous sound design), we’re free to let our senses wander between the sometimes humorous, sometimes off putting, and always porous borders between seen and seer.”

The Moveable Fest | Stephen Saito
"Enchanting...Takesue walks a fine line allowing for one to judge for themselves what they are seeing while gently injecting her own sense of discovery and good humor in curating the experience."

The Playlist | Charles Barfield
"Visually-stunning! ....showcases how tourism can have an effect on a country and its local people."

Hammer to Nail | Jonathan Marlowe
"Exquisite care to the picture and sound....Nearly all the roles associated with the making of the film are occupied by the filmmaker (who, by this point, has similarly established an immediate expectation of worthiness with anything to which her name is attached).

Modern Times Review | Steve Rickinson
"Compelling! ...Through a series of consistent wide shots, the camera never moving, to a sound tableau that picks up the most subtle touristic rustling…Onlookers not only grabs your gaze almost subconsciously, but it also elicits nostalgia and self-reflection of one's own such experiences."

Asian Movie Pulse | Marina Richter
“Onlookers motivates the viewers to ask themselves a question: why do we travel the way we do, with eyes wide shut?"

Seen Magazine | Dessane Lopez Cassell
“Kimi Takesue lays bare the performative nature of tourism, in all its graceless glory.”

Film Festival Today | Christopher Llewellyn Reed
“Mesmerizes…a cross between a travelogue and a tone poem.”

The New York Sun | Mario Naves
“Ravishing....There’s a strong hint of the theater to the director’s machinations and, with that, a sharp eye for composition and choreography....At moments, one is reminded of the expansive organizational facility of Pieter Brueghel.”

Metrograph Journal | Ari-Duong Nguyen
"Sublime...Takesue's documentary is an excursion that reveals surprises at every checkpoint."