MUBI (Criterion-affiliated streaming classic, foreign, independent movie site) - c/d, comments, recommendations, etc.

ahhhh... thanks. was quite unclear from my cursory 15 minutes of googling

The advantage of having something else other than Mubi is the search function, as far as we can tell. The Mubi interface (on our TV, anyway, I don't know about the web interface) has no search. We have to use the Apple TV's own search to search rather than browse.

I get mubi through my scribd subscription, which is $5/month.

Wow - that does seem like a great loophole, though Scribd seems to cost new subscribers $10 a month. Is Scribd itself good?

I mainly use it for audiobooks. Be warned that it's not actually unlimited -- if I listen to around 3 audiobooks within a month, they lock me out of most audiobooks for the rest of the month.

I threatened to cancel once and they reduced my price permanently.

Ah - that's something Mubi too, with some ridiculous "OK, we blinked first" message when you hit cancel.

The Library seems like a larger selection, rather than the full set of films being available (that would probably be suicide lol).

Anyway, Llanas' Extraordinary Stories is there and I'm going in this week.

llinas rules

On the 30 days I got to watch Hu's Wuxia films for the first time, and Awaara is a pretty good addition to their Indian cinema season. Might re-watch Sicilia, one of the best Straub-Huillet films XP fingers crossed. Really wanted to see the one week screening of La Flor (in three parts). Of course no time.

Apparently I’m in that phase where I like to write about the things I’m watching, so let’s go with it.

Swimming Pool (Ozon) is on at the moment and I watched it again today. I’ve seen it a couple of times already but not for at least 12 years and it’s still a really good watch. People always complain that it’s slow but I have never found it so. Sarah’s first solitary days in the house and wandering around the village struck a real chord with me - I have always been happy being alone and the sense of time and space stretching away from you like that is so freeing. This contrasts of course with how Sarah actually lives her life - Diet Coke and sweetener-enhanced yoghurt, clothes that disguise her entirely, disciplined waking times.

Into all this, of course, crashes Julie. I saw some thread on twitter a while back asking for opinions on “which actor had ever looked the best in a film” and Ludivine Sagnier in this would be up there for me - she’s luminous. Her Julie tosses her unbrushed hair over her shoulders, eats paté and cheese, smokes and drinks and brings men home. Sarah watches, first with anger at the intrusion and then with envy.

If you’ve seen this before then you know how it plays out. I thought, watching it again today, thatthe story that unfolds at the publisher’s house is not just the book that it becomes but the process of writing the book itself. Julie is changeable, and the several scene where a male character is standing gazing down at one of the women reminded me of writing and rewriting a piece to make it right. There are odd turns that don’t quite fit - when you have a scene or an idea that won’t leave you and must put it down immediately with a view to making it fit within the whole. Like when Sarah asks Julie why she did something and she replies “I don’t know,” - it’s Sarah the writer making her character do something because it struck her just so and needing to rationalise it afterwards. Whether any of it happened is not really the point because it’s about what it says it is at the beginning - a writer trying to do something different. Sarah changes because she’s written a book that is a complete inversion from her usual formula and she blossoms as a result. You really do love to see it.
Or so I thought anyway.

I think I've seen it a couple of times but not for about 12 years too. Your post makes me want a rewatch – thanks!

top tip: open a mubi account at the £9.99 a month rate, then cancel your subscription after a few weeks and then they make an improved "please stay" offer of £5.99 a month for a year. Well at least it worked for me tonight.

watched Edward Yang's The Terrorizers last night. Absolutely fantastic, best film I've watched this year

noticed that many of the 30-day films eventually transition into the library section but presumably not all. so it can be a bit hit or miss on whether you absolutely /need/ to watch a film when it's on the now showing feed. would be good if they could add a little marker to show those films which will be added to the library after 30 days

also: can't search on my TV (samsung) app nor add titles to a watch list

I couldn't find the library when I used the MUBI PS4 app on the tv either - it is so annoying I only watch stuff through my pc now.

Still processing Serra's Liberté, which debuted on Euro MUBI yesterday, but was left wondering if the BBFC even has any jurisdiction over this kind of sexually explicit material any longer...

I liked Liberte way more the day after after having thought about it than watching it. I don’t think that’s a knock necessarily, some work just functions that way.

*bump*

Curious about

Wittgenstein Plays Chess with Duchamp or How Not to Do Philosophy

It's lovely.

So sometimes Mubi sends an email that something is leaving soon and then in the app over that film it will say leaving in one week, but then other times it sends the notification email but the app doesn’t seem to say anything until the thing disappears, as seems to have been the case with India Song. What gives?

I watched Ida Lupino's The Hitch-Hiker last night. A decent 50's noir with William Talman putting in a good shift as a beastly psychopath who sleeps with one eye open.

I need to watch that, can't remember if I ever saw it. The last one I saw of hers was The Bigamist, which I would recommend.

https://bamlive.s3.amazonaws.com/styles/program_slide/s3/Lupino_Hitch-Hiker_002.jpg?itok=7Yig2VBK

I will be watching The Bigamist while it's still on there. Talman sports an incredible look in The Hitch-Hiker.

Is it going away soon? Didn’t notice.

I'm not totally sure about MUBI's rotation policy tbh, but they obv don't stream as many as n*****x and stuff does disappear every so often

mubi recently changed how it works, before it was 30 films, one gets removed and another added each day, to them having a library section, which seems to be stuff that is available permanently (or as permanently as anything on a streaming service is) and then the 'film of the day' section which has the 30 films like before (some of which go into the library, some don't)

i would highly recommend 'about some meaningless events' which was added to their library recently and is a genuine 10/10 stone cold masterpiece

Martin Eden showed up at some point recently.

US only it seems

Sorry, this special is not available in your country
Okay, I kind of hate it when I see this.

This is one of the few streaming services where you can use a V1R7U41 PR1V473 N37W0RK to pretend you are in a different land. It has always worked for me, anyway.

I just watched Swimming Pool, reviewed upthread.

Really impressed by Charlotte Rampling's performance as an uptight English person. She really captures the atmosphere and mannerisms of being an uptight rigid person, whilst hating yourself for being so, and the increasing envy of people who are freeing and obviously enjoying themselves more. The general atmosphere of heat and time slowing down in the country were also captured really well and seem very exotic from my current viewpoint.

Have resolved to make more of MUBI. Any more recommendations welcome...

Can strongly recommend Shiva Baby which has just appeared. Great debut film.

Just got an email to watch Drugstore Cowboy before it leaves in seven days.

Swimming Pool leaving (UK) MUBI shortly.

FOTD is Tom Ford’s A Single Man, which I liked quite a bit (not a widely shared view though).

Good news. One of your favourite films, The Giant is now showing.
The Giant
Johannes Nyholm

1) I no longer pay for mubi (I hope!)
2) I have never heard of this film.

In the middle of Sweat, which is pretty good so far.

Wonder if I spoke too soon, turned even darker than I expected.

Wonder whether I should watch Cedric Klapisch, the Lem festival, something else or nothing at all.

Lem festival?

Lem Centennial. Four films:
His Master’s Voice
The (Futurological) Congress
Roly Poly
Maska

The MUBI Podcast is very good - all about films that are huge in a specific country but mostly obscure outside it. Usually also made in that country but not always - there's one about a Mexican melodrama that flopped there but became a huge seller in the Soviet Union!

Irritatingly none of those are available here.

Just watched Chavela, which I recommend.

Might try to go see the new Jane Campion Western during the week and then the Romanian film over the weekend

Okay, completed phase one of this project.

i really would like to be well enough to go see the new Campion in theaters. what did you think?

i got a sub to this to get away from flipping thru the menus of shittier services for hours, but i rarely watch it lol

the last thing i caught was this quasi-horror movie and hfs it was GRIM: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wall_(2012_film)

i tried getting into this but it didn't really stick: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gangs_of_Wasseypur

other than that, idk, i got a kick out of those stop-motion 70s hungarian shorts

i really would like to be well enough to go see the new Campion in theaters. what did you think?