The Eagle Huntress looks amazing. The documentary’s images—featuring a grinning 13-year-old Aisholpan Nurgaiv as she holds a splendid eagle half her size—are the stuff of myths. I went in pumped up to see a girl-power/girl-falconer documentary with plenty of big, cool-looking birds, and I was not disappointed. First-time director Otto Bell accomplishes a level of visual beauty we associate with BBC nature specials or, IDK, Lord of the Rings? It’s breathtaking.

From the beginning of his production, Bell used his early footage—Eagle Huntress’s first shooting day happened to be the day Aisholpan snuck into a nest on a high rock face, making off with a young eaglet she named White Wings—to convince stars like Morgan Spurlock (Super Size Me) and Daisy Ridley (Star Wars!) to get onboard as executive producers. (Ridley lends her voice to the film’s narration, although there’s only about five minutes of it.)