Although relegation to a sidebar made the film harder to find amidst Cannes’ typical hustle and bustle, Mimosas made a strong impression on those who saw it, earning some of the festival’s best reviews and ultimately taking home their Critics’ Week Grand Prize. Oliver Laxe’s 16mm-shot, Morocco-set western has been praised for its rich, even hypnotic images, the effect of a spare narrative, and cultural narrative amidst certain genre trappings — and now it’s coming to the U.S. for a theatrical run, courtesy of Grasshopper Film.
You’ll get some taste for the picture’s particular approach in a U.S. trailer that’s just been released. And that’s an occasion not to be passed up: as we said in our review, “It’s a spiritual, ambiguously plotted journey through the Atlas Mountains, and those willing to give in to its mystical embrace and gorgeous visuals should find it a sensual, engrossing watch. Despite offerings of the open landscapes of North Africa, if there’s a wild west in Mimosas, it’s internal and spiritual, the quest being for meaning in a world that, like the film, doesn’t give easy answers.”
Watch the preview below:
Winner of the Critics’ Week Grand Prize at the Cannes Film Festival, Oliver Laxe’s stunning new film, Mimosas, is a breathtakingly shot Western that follows a mysterious caravan carrying a dying sheikh into the Moroccan Atlas Mountains. Somewhere in the desert, a caravan is escorting an elderly sheik to the village where he was born. His last wish is to be buried with his loved ones. But death does not wait. Without their leader, the company grows fearful. And at the foot of a mountain pass, they refuse to continue, entrusting the body to two men who agree to carry on and bring it to its final destination. But who are these men? And do they really know the way? In another world, a mysterious young man is chosen to find the caravan.
Mimosas begins its U.S. run on April 14.