You sound like you've been brainwashed by the patriarchy!

I can already tell this is the start of an obsession. After a double helping of Marvel-induced fatigue, I needed a palate cleanser, and I couldn't have picked a better choice. (Admittedly, my expectations were sky-high after the trailer and reading various interviews, articles etc, so a rewatch is needed to solidify the rating, but it didn't disappoint.)
Anna Biller is a true Renaissance woman - in this film, working on sets, music, costumes and editing, because evidently a simple 'writer/director' is far too conventional. I can't wait to dig into her back catalogue on the strength and the stylings of this particular film. There is only one major downside with her absolute artistic dedication - it means we have to wait until [apparently] 2023 for her next film, which, taking Bluebeard as its inspiration, should be a treat.
What I find almost as fascinating as the film itself is the critical dissonance surrounding it. So many reviews reference exploitation and horror films from the 60s and 70s, like the gaudy excesses off Russ Meyer. However, from various interviews with Biller (this is particularly detailed), she earnestly references Sirk melodramas, classic 50s Technicolor pictures, Cocteau. Many people will say 'trust the tale, not the teller', and I'm not saying I side with a particular view, but it's fascinating to hear an artist talk in such distinctly high terms about a film that on critical face value appears to aim so low.
And whether comparisons to Meyer etc are meant to denigrate Biller as some trash-maestro or not, it should be stressed that the film absolutely does not come across this way. It looks lush; shot in 35mm, the colours pop like a lurid three-strip dreamscape. On my list of shame is Guy Maddin's The Green Fog, which was made as a response to Vertigo; frankly, this film struck me like a response to that, with the other side of Scottie's warped vision: The Red Mist, perhaps?
Maddin is certainly a comparison that came to my mind - irrespective of whatever cinephilic adjuncts you happen to find, it's undeniably like an ethereal conjuring of the past. There are sequences with the most persuasively tacky spellbooks, candles, goblets and Tarot paraphernalia, so much so that the appearance of a mobile phone is a moment of cultural whiplash. Even with the modern-day trappings, the characters feel much more at home in their 'magickal' dungeons and medieval fayres.
And the Love Witch herself is a brilliantly subversive creation. A white witch, dedicated to finding a man to whom she can act out his fantasies; where sex magic equals love magic and love means eternal devotion. There's a fantastic scene where a teacher, under the spell of one of Elaine's potions (just the notion of a witch called Elaine is genius), utters an outpouring of feeling to her: her response is short, "what a pussy". And then of course, the general state of men starts eroding her fantasy of love, and the bodies start piling up. It's an absolute trip.