I know it feels like we’ve all reached a point of oversaturation with streaming services — one of the primary assumptions upon which this newsletter operates is the idea that we are all drowning in a sea of content. But if you care enough to curate, then I get the sensation you might find the service MUBI well worth your time and money. Through this Sunday, 8/21 they are running a remarkable deal offering 3 months for just $1. You should take it, and here’s why.
MUBI has a little bit of everything, as I hope to demonstrate in the ten titles worth streaming below, and they specialize in elevating under-the-radar global cinema that often struggles to break through without careful guidance. They’ve long been the shore upon which many an undistributed film festival favorite washes up. The service is now capitalizing on some of that brand equity they have built up among hardcore arthouse fans and are exploring how to make the consumer’s new subscription-based mindset sustainable.
MUBI subscribers in NYC and now Chicago (with other cities likely on the way) also get access to MUBI GO with their subscription. This is essentially a pared-down MoviePass, offering access to one curated title a week in theaters. It’s a nice nod to the reality that streaming should not replace theaters so much as it should be an additive to them. Both can benefit from each other’s success if the right ecosystem exists — and with arthouse audiences among the slowest to return following the pandemic, MUBI’s efforts to remake the landscape are noble.
The company has also begun moving into buying, making, and distributing its own projects from emerging and established global talents alike. If the Netflix auteur bubble is primed to pop in the near future, MUBI stands to sweep up what they left behind. Their exclusive releases section is already quite stacked, and I think they’re going to get a big boost later this year from Korean filmmaker Park Chan-wook’s Decision to Leave. This offering is only just beginning.
So don’t just make an expenditure in MUBI — make an investment in them and the future of cinema. If you need a guide on how to make the most of your first three months on the platform, allow me to shepherd you toward some of my favorite films currently available there.
If you’ve enjoyed the so-called “Greek Weird Wave” stylings of Yorgos Lanthimos (The Lobster, The Favourite), then you should go deeper down the country’s aesthetic rabbit hole with Attenberg. Athina Rachel Tsangari’s off-beat comedy is somewhat of a coming-of-age story as Ariane Labed’s Marina begins her tentative exploration of sexuality. The film delivers absurdity with an unflinching poker face to hilarious, provocative effect.
If your idea of an “indie movie” does not stretch beyond eight-figure budgeted starry Sundance titles, expand your definition by seeing what truly scrappy, DIY filmmaking looks like. Alex Ross Perry’s The Color Wheel is a testament to what a great filmmaker can do with a vision, a great script, and committed collaboration. This acerbic road trip comedy is a withering look at how sibling bonds get pushed to their breaking point in a moment of tension. The jokes are as black as the coloring of the film itself, and Perry is not afraid to draw some blood. You may be laughing hard enough not to notice how you’re bruised by the experience.
Did you know Helen Keller (yes, that one, of your middle school jokes fame) had a full life beyond The Miracle Worker plot? Until I saw John Gianvito’s documentary Her Socialist Smile, I had fully no idea that Keller went on to agitate for leftist policies through her writings. The film provides a necessary corrective to the flattened historical record of Keller but does so in an unexpected and visually striking manner. Don’t expect the usual talking heads telling you about Keller; Gianvito finds a way to bring her words to life.
The Zellner Brothers are a curious bunch who always manage to delight with their off-kilter sensibilities. Before they leveled up to direct Damsel with Robert Pattinson, they started off with this quietly uproarious tale of itinerant childhood. Kid-Thing is a twisted tribute to the wonders of the analog world as the 10-year-old Annie simply lets her imagination run wild in rural Texas. The Zellners avoid the easy traps of nostalgia, however, rendering the lifestage in a light that’s both humorous and honest.
If you think it’s better to feel a documentary than see or hear from it, then Leviathan is right up your alley. This first feature for Harvard’s Sensory Ethnography Lab (SEL) pushed the non-fiction form forward through its propulsive observations of the commercial fishing industry. Utilizing GoPro-style camera footage to capture the immediacy of the activity and still static frames to document the accompanying listlessness, this is an astounding peek into a world we’ve largely rendered invisible to us despite its deep ties to our diets.
“Economic inequality” has become quite a political buzzword over the past decade, yet it can often feel vague and conceptual given the ways in which the dominant class has tried to suppress its visibility in our society. Brazilian director Kleber Mendonça Filho lays it all bare in his debut feature Neighboring Sounds, an ensemble drama set in a coastal city where urbanites’ problems become each other’s business by virtue of their close proximity. Don’t expect the bloody brawl of Parasite when the resentments break open so much as a delicately controlled burn as the introduction of a new security force in the neighborhood turns up the heat on simmering tensions.
If you were among the many charmed by last year’s The Worst Person in the World, did you know there are two previous films in Joachim Trier’s so-called “Oslo Trilogy?” The crown jewel of the bunch might still be his 2012 Oslo, August 31st, also starring Anders Danielsen Lie. This tender, aching drama follows a heroin addict who returns home and faces the challenges of starting over in a place where his wounds still seem fresh. The movie on the whole is great, but this is absolutely worth seeing for the stunning acting showcase by Lie. He’s devastatingly vulnerable and appears uncannily comfortable looking uncomfortable in both his skin and city.
Gus Van Sant was among the first directors to dramatize school shootings post-Columbine with his controversial 2003 feature Elephant. I’m glad the brouhaha didn’t scare him away entirely because his subsequent film set amongst contemporary youth, Paranoid Park, is an even more vividly realized portrait of teen angst and confusion. This nonlinear portrait is a tense trip inside the jumbled mind of an adolescent skateboarder trying to make sense of a traumatic event as he’s trying to determine his sense of self in parallel.
Voyage of Time: The IMAX Experience
If you liked all the nature parts of Terrence Malick’s celestial opus The Tree of Life but could do without all the annoying Sean Penn stuff, have I got a treat for you! Malick spliced together unused footage from the film into a 46-minute documentary ruminating on the nature of life and existence. And if the dazzling visuals weren’t enough, none other than Cate Blanchett lends her voice to read the poetic narration. Think Planet Earth with a little bit more of a theological bent.
Plot is overrated, said director Diao Yinan when he introduced The Wild Goose Lake to my screening at NYFF. Just enjoy the mood, he instructed the audience. And when I just let the shifting sands of violence, tedium, and paranoia wash over me like the film’s pervasive neon lights, I was completely rapt. Don’t be afraid to look up a plot summary before this Chinese crime drama to heighten your viewing pleasure. This exciting, energizing take on neo-noir tropes expertly conveys vibes both complementary and clashing.
You can always keep up with my film-watching in real-time on the app Letterboxd. I’ve also compiled every movie I’ve ever recommended through this newsletter via a list on the platform as well.
While this episode of Plain English is primarily about music, it applies to just about everything in culture where nostalgia seems to cloud the new.
I would probably rank Elvis as one of my least favorite movies of the summer, but I’ve been riveted by its megafans who will go to the mats defending Baz Luhrmann’s bombastic biopic. My friend and erstwhile editor Ethan Warren has been logging a watch of the film every week or so on Letterboxd, and I’m glad he’s penned this tribute piece so I can stop being worried for his health/sanity:
For The Playlist, I reviewed the pretty dismal Orphan: First Kill. As I mention, it has one (1) half-decent twist that I wish it could have committed to more fully.
Subscribers got a personally-tinged analysis of Rachel Getting Married, the 2008 film I’ve jokingly referred to as “the cure for the common Hathahater.” It’s available to watch on Hulu, should you be so inclined to check it out.
That’s it for today! A note: you may notice a slight change in verbiage around here as I’ve shifted away from calling posts by “Monday” and “Thursday” as delineators. That was a schedule tough to adhere to, so I’ve shifted to “weekday” (always free) and “weekend” (usually paid subscriber only). Hopefully by this weekend, I’ll have finally collected all my thoughts on Hamaguchi so I can stop teasing it in the footer!
Yours in service and cinema,
Marshall