David Farnor | On 03, Aug 2019

MUBI is diving into the world of Denis Villeneuve this weekend with his mind-bending mystery Enemy, kicking off a week that showcases some equally distinctive directors, including Christian Petzold and Jeff Feuerzeig. This is also your last chance to catch Knife + Heart or Border, if you missed them in cinemas.

Want to see something on the big screen? Use MUBI Go (which offers a free cinema ticket every week to its subscribers), to see Photograph at participating theatres, the charming latest film from the director of The Lunchbox.

What’s new, coming soon and leaving soon on the subscription service? This is your weekly MUBI Digest:

 

This week on MUBI

Enemy – 3rd August

Before Blade Runner 2049 and Arrival, Denis Villeneuve blew minds with his twisting, confusing, scary drama starring Jake Gyllenhaal.
Read our interview with director Denis Villeneuve – and our review of the film here.

Certified Copy – 4th August

Abbas Kiarostami directors this story of a meeting between a man and a woman in a village in Southern Tuscany. He is a British author who has just finished giving a lecture at a conference. She is French and owns an art gallery. Together they tour the village and discover that nothing is quite what it seems.

Mr. Nobody – 5th August

Jared Leto and Diane Kruger star in this 2009 fantasy about the last mortal human on Earth, who reflects on his life and the ones he might have led.

Too Early Too Late – 6th August

MUBI’s Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet retrospective continues with this 1982 documentary that investigates the changing relationship between people, the land, and society in France and Egypt. Shot during the anxious months of 1980, it follows the Camp David Accords and later the assassination of Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat.

Barbara – 7th August

In 1980s East Germany, Barbara is a Berlin doctor banished to a country medical clinic for applying for an exit visa. Deeply unhappy with her reassignment and fearful of her co-workers as possible Stasi informants, Barbara stays aloof, especially from the good natured clinic head, Andre.

Fausto – 8th August

On the Oaxacan coast of Mexico, tales of shapeshifting, telepathy and dealings with the devil are embedded in the colonization of the Americas. Characters from the Faust legend mingle with the inhabitants, while attempting to control nature through a seemingly never-ending building project.

The Devil & Daniel Johnston – 9th August

Daniel Johnston is a manic depressive, defiantly lo-fi, cult singer/songwriter/artist, whose work has proved inspirational to fans and musicians alike. Mixing archive material and his prodigious films, drawings and music, Johnston is revealed in this portrait of madness, creative genius, and love from Author: The JT LeRoy Story director Jeff Feuerzeig.

 

Other new releases on MUBI

Eastwood: High Plains Drifter

A drifter with no name wanders into a small town, where his gun-slinging abilities are in high demand. After being met with disapproval, locals soon realize he could help them fend off a band of criminals who have been terrorizing the town. He agrees to help, but does so with his own secret agenda. Clint Eastwood’s second film as director, the film is even more notable for its divisive, controversial reception.

Summer Hours

When elderly matriarch Hélène discovers that her health is declining, she contacts her three children about contending with her art collection after her death. As the family gathers they must decide what to do with the inherited country estate and objects, while they also grapple with her mortality.

I Don’t Want to Sleep Alone

Rawang, an immigrant from Bangladesh living in awful conditions, takes pity on a Chinese man, Hsiao-kang, who is beaten up and left in the street. Rawang lovingly nurses him on a mattress he found. When he is almost healed, Hsiao-kang meets the waitress Chyi. His love for Rawang is put to the test.

Season of the Devil

Philippines, late 1970s. A military-controlled militia is oppressing a remote village, spreading terror both physical and psychological. The fearless young doctor Lorena who opened a clinic for the poor disappears without a trace. Her husband, activist poet Hugo Haniway, attempts to find her in Lav Diaz’s typically idiosyncratic 2018 musical.

Heaven Knows What

The film that led to the Safdie brothers working with Robert Pattinson on Good Time, Heaven Knows What immerses us in the restless world of Harley, heroin junkie in today’s New York. Tangled up in the melancholy romance of a destructive relationship with Ilja, she seeks solace with another addict, Mike. Based on the experiences of Arielle Holmes, who herself plays Harley. Read our review

Emerald Cities

In a near-future 1980s, a small desert town’s Santa Claus goes to the big city in search of his wayward daughter. On that simple premise hangs this delirious punk rock collage of Cold War fears, suburban encroachment, and magic mushroom sandwiches.

The Wayward Cloud

The tender missed connection of What Time Is It There?has another chance in Taipei: Hsiao-Kang, now working as an adult movie actor, meets Shiang-chyi once again. Meanwhile, the city faces a water shortage that makes the sales of watermelons skyrocket. Can a distant love conquer (or save) all?

Juliette Binoche: Code Unknown: Incomplete Tales of Several Journeys

Michael Haneke made his debut with this study of violence in the streets of Paris. On a busy Paris boulevard, a youth scornfully tosses a crumpled paper bag into the outstretched hands of a beggar woman. This is the bond which, for an instant, links several very different characters: an actress, a war photographer, a farmer, a music teacher, and an immigrant.

Juliette Binoche: The Lovers on the Bridge

Following Mauvais Sang, punk paragon of cool Leos Carax (Holy Motors) reunites Juliette Binoche and Denis Lavant for this unconventional, yet romantic amour fou inspired by Jean Vigo’s L’Atalante.

Half Nelson

Ryan Gosling caught the world’s eye with this indie drama, which sees him play an inner-city teacher, who becomes friends with one of his pupils.

The Wakhan Front

Afghanistan 2014. As the army withdrawal approaches, Captain Bonassieu and his squad are on a surveillance mission in a valley on the border with Pakistan. Despite their determination, control of the remote valley will fall out of their hands. One night, soldiers begin to mysteriously disappear.

David Lynch: Inland Empire

Laura Dern stars in Lynch’s most fragmented, experimental film in this dizzying follow-up to Mulholland, which filters Hollywood through a surreal nightmare.

MUBI Auteurs: Buy Me A Gun

In a world overcome with violence, where women are prostituted and murdered, a girl wears a Hulk mask and a chain around her ankle to hide her gender and help her dad, a tormented addict, take care of an abandoned baseball field where drug dealers play.

Braguino

In the Siberian forest, away from any civilization, a feud is brewing between two opposing families whose houses are separated by a river. In the middle of the river stands an island where the kids of the two families are meeting on their own.

MUBI Release: Border

Tina is a customs agent with a nose for trouble. She can literally smell human emotions, which is a handy talent for sniffing out suspicious border crossers. But when a mysterious male traveller’s odour confounds her, she’s faced with hugely disturbing insights about who she is and what she wants. Read our interview with director Ali Abassi.

The Man Behind the Microphone

MUBI teams up witith Shubbak, London’s largest festival of Arab culture, to present this documentary about legendary singer Hédi Jouini, known as the ‘Frank Sinatra of Tunisia’.

Pride: O Fantasma

Portuguese auteur emerged with his first feature-length fiction film, a, fragmented story exploring nocturnal escapades set in the dark and surreal streets of Lisbon.

Straub-Huillet: From the Clouds to the Resistance

The first of many rewarding encounters between Cesare Pavese and Straub-Huillet, who adapt the Italian author’s tales of the meeting between gods and men—set in nature.

MUBI Undiscovered: Jamilia

This documentary uses a literary classic as a cultural passkey to allow women to talk about their feelings, frustrations, and hopes of love in Kyrgyzstan.

MUBI Release: Knife + Heart

Vanessa Paradis stars as a gay porn producer in Yann Gonzalez’s titillating, neon-soaked giallo pastiche. With a retro-electro score by M83, and shot on 35mm & 16mm, it’s a provocative, kitsch throwback to vintage slasher films.

Cold Weather

Doug, an aimless former student of forensic science and aficionado of Sherlock Holmes, moves back home to Portland eager to simplify his life. Just when everything seems perfectly quiet, a mystery shakes him from his slumber. But are the signs he’s reading really evidence of foul play?

MUBI Rediscovered: Adoption (1975)

Hungarian filmmaker Márta Mészáros won the Golden Bear in 1975 for this drama, becoming the first female filmmaker to win the prestigious prize. The film zeroes in on two women: Kata, older and widowed, and Anna, a downtrodden young women kept in a children’s institution by her unloving parents.

Eastwood: Play Misty for Me

A brief fling between a male disc jockey and an obsessed female fan takes a frightening, and perhaps even deadly turn when another woman enters the picture.

 

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Last chance to stream: Titles leaving MUBI soon

Knife + Heart
Available until end of: 3rd August

The Elephant Man
Available until end of: 4th August

Mauvais Sang
Available until end of: 5th August

Islands
Available until end of: 6th August

The Machinist
Available until end of: 7th August

I’m a Cyborg, But That’s OK
Available until end of: 8th August

Battle in Heaven
Available until end of: 9th August

Border
Available until end of: 10th August

 

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