Mubi produces Mia Hansen-Løve’s next film “If Love Should Die”

Pascal Chantier

Mia Hansen-Løve, one of France’s leading filmmakers whose films have been shown at Cannes, Berlin and Toronto, will next direct If Love Should Die, an ambitious feature film about the life of visionary English writer and philosopher Mary Wollstonecraft.

Mubi, the auteur-driven global distribution and streaming powerhouse, is producing “If Love Should Die,” starring Georgina Paget and Thembisa Cochrane at UK flagship Caspian Films (“The Colour Room”); “Anatomy of a Fall” producer David Thion and Philippe Martin at Paris-based Les Films Pelléas; Norway’s Mer Film, Lorenzo Mieli for Our Films and Arte France Cinema. Mubi and Arte France Cinema are financing the production, with The Match Factory handling worldwide distribution.

Written and directed by Hansen-Løve, the film tells for the first time the journey of Wollstonecraft, an 18th-century feminist pioneer whose ideas still resonate today.

“On the eve of the French Revolution, an impoverished young Englishwoman makes the courageous decision to live her life according to the ideals of the Enlightenment,” the synopsis states.

Filming is scheduled to begin in 2025 in the UK, France, Scandinavia and Portugal.

Hansen-Løve, whose latest film, “One Fine Morning,” starring Lea Seydoux, screened at the Directors Fortnight in Cannes in 2022 and was acquired by Sony Pictures Classics, has wanted to do a project about Wollstonecraft for several years. “My aim is to capture this crucial era and the life of a woman that cinema has never looked at before with as much poignancy and truth as possible,” said Hansen-Løve, who pointed out that Wollstonecraft was “an icon in England” but “not well known in France.”

“That suits me: making a film about a character who is too predictable or too famous has never interested me. I am attracted to characters who are searching and who have no certainties,” said the thoughtful director. “The souls of artists, no doubt, but I draw inspiration from the most fragile and vulnerable among them,” she continued.

Hansen-Løve’s debut, All is Forgiven, screened at Directors’ Forntight, won the 2006 Louis Delluc Prize for Best First Feature and was nominated for the César for Best First Feature. Her second film, Father Of My Children, won the Special Jury Prize at Un Certain Regard at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival. She then directed Isabelle Huppert’s Things To Come, which won several awards including the Silver Bear at Berlin in 2016, and made her debut in competition at Cannes in 2021 with Bergman Island, starring Mia Wasikowska, Tim Roth and Vicky Krieps.

Mubi said in a statement that it was “an honor to work with Mia again. As huge admirers of Mia’s work, this is the third film we have collaborated on with her and we look forward to bringing Mary Wollstonecraft’s extraordinary and groundbreaking life to the screen for the first time with ‘If Love Should Die.'”

The project underscores Mubi’s commitment to leveraging its global firepower to support big-name directors worldwide. The company, which continues to expand outside its core streaming business, is also producing Jim Jarmusch’s highly anticipated film “Father Mother Sister Brother,” starring Adam Driver, Tom Waits, Mayim Bialik and Cate Blanchett. Founded by London-based cinephile Efe Cakarel, the company bought several high-profile films from this year’s competition at Cannes, including Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance,” which it will release in North America, the UK, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Latin America and the Benelux countries. The company also owns rights to the film in Turkey and India.

Mubi previously worked with Hansen-Løve on “One Fine Morning,” which it distributed in the UK and Ireland.