The MUBI Weekly Digest | 12th October 2019
David Farnor | On 12, Oct 2019
MUBI continues its London Film Festival picks this week, after the release of the brilliant Beanpole, as Zombi Child arrives online to stream. Before that, there’s the equally impressive double-bill of Steven Soderbergh’s Che biopic.
Want to see something on the big screen? Use MUBI Go (which offers a free cinema ticket every week to its subscribers), to see Tehran: City of Love at participating theatres.
What’s new, coming soon and leaving soon on the subscription service? This is your weekly MUBI Digest:
This week on MUBI
Che: The Argentine – 12th October
The first film in this two-part Che Guevara epic tracks Che’s rise in the Cuban Revolution, from doctor to commander to revolutionary hero. After joining Fidel Castro’s rebels and journeying to Cuba in 1956, he quickly grasps the art of guerrilla warfare, ultimately toppling Batista’s dictatorship.
Che: Guerrilla – 13th October
Following the Cuban Revolution, Che Guevara, at the peak of his fame and power, vanishes without a trace. Resurfacing in Bolivia, he sets about recruiting insurgents to help him spread the revolutionary message. But communication lines are broken, support is lacking, and the CIA closes in on him.
I Do Not Care If We Go Down in History as Barbarians – 14th October
Mariana, an outspoken young artist, is attempting to an ambitious project to reconstruct the anti-Semitic 1941 Odessa Massacre. While she develops her spectacular, she is forced to confront and overcome objections from the authorities and locals hired as extras in order to see her vision through.
Martin Rejtman: Shakti – 15th October
Federico, in his mid-20s, lives alone in Buenos Aires. The day his grandmother dies, he decides to part with his girlfriend. He fears hurting her. However, she is laid-back, feisty and not even close to feeling hurt. He begins obsessing over her unexpected reaction—but then he meets someone else.
Island – 16th October
Across the water on the Isle of Wight four individuals experience the end of life. Illness progresses, relationships shift, and we are witness to rarely seen and intensely private moments.
The Seventh Continent – 17th October
Haneke’s debut feature film is inspired by a true story of an Austrian middle class family that committed suicide. The film chronicles the last years of the family, which consists of Georg, an engineer; his wife Anna, an optician; and their young daughter, Eva.
LFF: Zombi Child – 18th October
Haiti, 1962. A man is brought back from the dead only to be sent to the living hell of the sugarcane fields. In Paris, 55 years later, at the prestigious Légion d’honneur boarding school, a Haitian girl confesses an old family secret to a group of new friends—with unthinkable consequences. Read our review.
Other new releases on MUBI
LFF: Beanpole
An entrancing immersion into post-war turmoil and a towering ode to female resilience — with tour-de-force performances and a jaw-dropping use of colour. Read our review.
The Transfiguration
A harrowing tale of obsession and young love in the far reaches of NYC.
Pixote: The Law of the Weakest
A visceral look at the street kids of São Paulo, with echoes of Buñuel’s Los Olvidados but with a raw authenticity of its own.
Straub-Huillet: Communists
MUBI’s Straub-Huillet retrospective concludes the most recent feature by Straub (Huillet died in 2006), which composes scenes from their movies to reveal a story told across their work: that of the attempt to forge community and resistance.
Suspiria (2018)
Tilda Swinton and Dakota Johnson star in a new take on the 1977 original cult classic, with a mesmeric score by Radiohead’s Thom Yorke.
Suspiria (1977)
Dario Argento’s original is a psychedelic horror classic – a gothic nightmare told in exceptionally vivid colour, and a rich exercise in heightened style.
Psycho (1960)
Shockingly effective in 1960, the brilliance of Hitchcock’s horror remains undimmed to this day.
Psycho (1998)
Gus Van Sant’s remake — shot by Christopher Doyle in colour — is a brazenly experimental film made in the mainstream.
Veslemoy’s Song
This exquisitely crafted short — made on hand-processed black-and-white 16mm — by Sofia Bohdanowicz (Maison du Bonheur) touchingly tells of the re-discovery of a forgotten female Canadian artist.
Martin Rejtman: Two Shots Fired
Rejtman’s comeback 11 years after The Magic Gloves is a fascinating and subversive exercise in comedy: its sophisticated storytelling, dark humour and deadpan beauty are just genius.
byNWR: The Believer’s Heaven
The third and final evangelical cinema collaboration between Rev. Estus Pirkle and directors Ron and June Ormond depicts the glory of Heaven — with a clear warning for what awaits sinners.
“Since all of the original negatives of Pirkle-Ormond films were destroyed in a 2010 flood of biblical proportions, byNWR has done extensive restoration work on the existing duplicate 16mm film elements to present the best version of The Believer’s Heaven which has yet been made available.” —NWR
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World
Edgar Wright’s hyperactive style is a perfect fit for Bryan Lee O’Malley’s graphic novels about Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera), a member of the band Sex Bom-Omb and a video game obsessive. Torn between two women, one of whom (Ramona Flowers) is literally his dream love, Scott has to fight all of Ramona’s exes to date her. This coming-of-age comedy tackles everything from projecting your ideals onto others and getting over past relationships to the way a young man uses computer games to understand the world. The stunning visuals, exciting action and laugh-out-loud jokes are the icing on a pixellated cake.
Shaun of the Dead
“You’ve got red on you.”
Thursday Till Sunday
As she and her family embark on a four-day holiday to the north of Chile, teenager Mazda slowly comes to the realization that her parents might be splitting up. Their journey that starts so cheerfully quickly acquires melancholy undertones. This will be their last trip as a family.
Workers, Peasants
Amateur actors from the regional Buti theater, many of them ordinary laborers and farmers, recite passages from a novella which centers on a group of workers who rebuild their lives in the the aftermath of the Second World War.
The Magic Gloves
This film follows the crisscrossed fortunes of, among others, a rock musician, a flight attendant, a dog walker with an alarming penchant for over-the-counter medication, and a cab driver, who doesn’t really care about his life spiralling out of control, as long as he can sit in his old Renault 12.
Manta Ray
Near a coastal village of Thailand, a local fisherman rescues a stranger, who does not speak a word, offers him his friendship and names him Thongchai. When the fisherman suddenly disappears at sea, Thongchai slowly begins to take over his friend’s life—his house, his job and his marriage.
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Last chance to stream: Titles leaving MUBI soon
Kika
Available until end of: 12th October
Purple Noon
Available until end of: 13th October
The Deep Blue Sea
Available until end of: 14th October
Too Late to Die Young
Available until end of: 15th October
How Fernando Pessoa Saved Portugal
Available until end of: 16th October
Mobile Homes
Available until end of: 17th October
Silvia Prieto
Available until end of: 18th October
The Flower of My Secret
Available until end of: 19th October