67
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
What are people saying?
What are critics saying?
90
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.
100
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.
80
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.
80
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.
75
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.
60
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.