In an interview after the release of her debut feature Viva (2007), American writer-director Anna Biller admits there exists a layered co-presence of sincerity and irony in her work:

Based in Los Angeles, Biller has made two features so far in her career, Viva and The Love Witch (2016), as well as four short films: Three Examples of Myself as Queen (1994), Fairy Ballet (1998), The Hypnotist (2001) and A Visit from the Incubus (2001). In over twenty-five years of filmmaking, her reputation has grown from that of an underground filmmaker to a noted independent auteur. In 2019, the speciality distributor Criterion released Biller’s short films on its streaming service, an act that firmly situated her oeuvre within an art cinema context. In an article accompanying the release, Hillary Weston notes that Biller had ‘emerged from the underground’ following her second feature The Love Witch, achieving widespread recognition. Biller’s films are indeed idiosyncratic and immediately recognisable for their retrospective aesthetics. The Love Witch and Viva meticulously recreate the performance styles, sets, lighting design and costumes of bygone eras and genres, such as melodrama and sexploitation. Biller is also famed for her artisanal approach to production, which lends her films a handmade quality that is apparent in her mise en scène. She not only writes, produces and directs her films, she also oversees the art direction and production design, sews costumes, edits, decorates sets, creates and sources props and composes music and lyrics for her films. Alexandra Heller-Nicholas describes Biller as an ‘all-round Renaissance woman’, while Kim Morgan calls her ‘every inch the auteur’.

Though frequently positive, the reception of Biller’s work has been varied. Critics are divided over the tone and meaning of her films; specifically, whether she is, to use Biller’s terms, a ‘poser’ or an innocent.