David Farnor | On 18, May 2017

MUBI is heading to Cannes once again this year, with the world’s biggest film festival taking over the subscription service to offer a collection of Croisette favourites, old and new.

Every year, the creme de la creme of the movie industry flock to the French Riviera for a fortnight of premieres, boozing and schmoozing, and MUBI has been increasingly at the centre of it, joining rivals such as Amazon and Netflix in trying to snap up the best titles from the festival’s line-up. Last year, MUBI snapped up The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Maki, which won the Un Certain Regard award at the festival, and also picked up Bruno Dumont’s Slack Bay (Ma Loute).

MUBI’s founder Efe Cakarel said at the time: “We were looking for something really special at Cannes this year and in Olli Maki and Ma Loute we have found just that.”

Since then, the company has signed a deal with the festival’s Quinzaine des Réalisateurs (Directors’ Fortnight), which took the form of a year-long collaboration, sharing iconic films every month that have screened in the prestigious Cannes programme on MUBI’s global VOD platform.

Now, as Cannes kicks off again, MUBI is bringing a slice of the action to living rooms in the UK, with its own fortnight of film treats – all centred around the exclusive online premiere of Olli Maki.

Here’s what’s on the way:

Dear Diary, 1963 – Nanni Moretti

“Dear Diary, there is something I like to do more than anything else…” These lines open the author’s diary, the confidant of the most hidden thoughts. A diary in images, as free and light as only personal thoughts can be.

The Taste of Money, 2012 – Im Sang-Soo

Desire, sex and murder in a conglomerate-owning family. Newly-hired gofer Young-Jak Joo becomes a key pawn in a powerful South Korean corporate-crime family obsessed with sex, money, and intrigue.

The Happiest Day in the Life of Olli Mäki, 2016 – Juho Kuosmanen

Finland, 1962. Boxer Olli Mäki is 26 years old and in love. He comes from a humble background – his manager Elis Ask however wants to turn him into a glamorous boxing star. Olli is expected to be the first Finnish boxer to defeat the US-American world champion.

Tip Top, 2003 – Serge Bozon

Bright interior, dark outside. Two women, struggling against external hostility and internal demons. Playing with the mood of Alfred Hitchcock’s Trouble With Harry, Serge Bozon invites us in an exhilarating and recreational English crime comedy style.

Eyes Wide Open, 2009 – Haim Tabakman

A gay love story in the heart of the ultra-Orthodox Jewish community in Jerusalem. The enormous pressure created by the community around the men triggers an irreversible act.

Salvo, 2013 – Fabio Grassadonia and Antonio Piazza

With their new film opening the Semaine de la Critique, Grassadonia and Piazza’s Salvo comes to MUBI. A hitman for the Sicilian Mafia, Salvo is solitary and ruthless. When he sneaks into a house to eliminate a man, he discovers Rita, a young blind girl who powerlessly stands by while her brother is assassinated. Salvo tries to close those disturbing eyes, when something impossible happens…

Aliyah, 2012 – Elie Wajeman

Alex, a young drug dealer in Paris, is torn between making his aliyah (the term for Jews emigrating to Israel), his drug selling, his complicated love life and a destructive brother. He will have to find his own way and make a final decision.

After The Battle, 2012 – Yousry Nasrallah

Once a member of the notorious groups that were coerced by the Egyptian government to attack the protestors in Tahir Square in 2011, Mahmoud has since lost his job and been ostracized by his own community. A chance encounter with a secular young divorcee will change both of their lives forever.

Time of the Gypsies, 1988 – Emir Kusturica

In this luminous tale set in the area around Sarajevo and in Italy, Perhan, an engaging young Romani (gypsy) with telekinetic powers, is seduced by the quick-cash world of petty crime, which threatens to destroy him and those he loves.

Sex,Lies, and Videotapes, 1989 – Steven Soderbergh

A multiple prize winner at both Cannes and Sundance, Steven Soderbergh’s feature debut concerns a man who films women discussing their sexuality on camera and his relationship with two very different sisters who are both sleeping with the same man.

 
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