Film Threat by Bradley Gibson

Anyone seeking motivation, or just looking for inspiration, will marvel at the life story of Valerie Taylor, her sharks, and her love of the sea. She is a treasure, as is Sally Aitken for bringing her story to the screen.

TheWrap by Alonso Duralde

Even people who felt nervous about stepping into a bathtub after “Jaws” might find themselves giving these denizens of the deep the benefit of the doubt, thanks both to Taylor’s decades of advocacy and Aitken’s moving portrait of grace and compassion in and out of the water.

Wall Street Journal by John Anderson

Playing With Sharks has its visual thrills but also tells one good story after another, not only about making movies and flirting with death but about the nature of the fish and the steely character of the movie’s human subject.

Variety by Jessica Kiang

If the tone of the film is uniformly admiring, Taylor is often critical of the younger woman who appears in these frames, frankly expressing regrets and self-recrimination about those less enlightened days when sub-aquatic hunting was her bread and butter.

The Hollywood Reporter by David Rooney

The very personal nature of Taylor’s involvement with these magnificent creatures makes this quite an affecting account of their threatened survival.

The Film Stage by Juan Barquin

Playing With Sharks could have easily been another documentary heaping praise onto an individual, but it works so well because it allows its subject to engage with her greatest regrets as much as her greatest achievements.

IndieWire by Christian Blauvelt

Setting the Taylors’ footage in such a quotidian structure is like setting the world’s most beautiful diamond in a ring pulled from a Cracker Jack box

IndieWire

Setting the Taylors’ footage in such a quotidian structure is like setting the world’s most beautiful diamond in a ring pulled from a Cracker Jack box

The New York Times by Natalia Winkelman

Playing With Sharks would like to position Valerie as both intrepid diver and valiant activist, but with its focus on thrills and gills, the film goes light on the context needed to reconcile these two identities.

CineVue by Matthew Anderson

The extraordinary amount of footage, which moves from monochrome, to grainy colour, to vibrant turquoises as technology and time march on, is really a wonder to behold. If, wherever you are in the world, there’s the opportunity to see Playing with Sharks on the big screen, then you should, to fully experience this eye-opening, vivid documentary.