There is something merciless in the way Lynne Ramsay films women. Not cruel—merciless. Her camera does not flinch. It does not soften. It stays close, even when you want to look away. In Die My Love, which MUBI is releasing wide this weekend, she turns that unflinching gaze on Jennifer Lawrence, who plays a writer unraveling in the fog of postpartum psychosis. The performance is confrontational, abrasive—closer to her work in Aronofsky’s mother! than anything she’s done since. The color palette is muted greens and grays, the kind that suggest nausea more than nature. The sound design hums with the low-frequency dread of a mind turning on itself. It is not a performance designed to be liked. It is designed to be felt.
And that is the problem. Or the opportunity. Comme un rêve interrompu—like a dream interrupted, perpetually. Depending on how the Academy is feeling this year.
MUBI is taking the film wide without the traditional platform release, following the trajectory that worked for The Substance last year—though no one expects Die My Love to replicate that film’s $17 million U.S. box office. The goal here is not ticket sales. It is visibility. It is Oscar positioning. It is luring subscribers to MUBI’s arthouse streaming platform by proving they are the distributor willing to champion difficult, uncompromising work. Whether that strategy can carry Lawrence into a Best Actress nomination alongside Jessie Buckley, Renate Reinsve, Emma Stone, Rose Byrne, and Cynthia Erivo remains uncertain. But the campaign is underway, and the film is entering its most vulnerable phase: post-Cannes reassessment, wide release exposure, and the long, quiet scramble for Academy attention.
The Performance: Confrontation as Method
Lawrence shot Die My Love while in her second trimester with her second child. She filmed in Calgary, alongside Robert Pattinson (her hapless, well-meaning husband), Sissy Spacek, Nick Nolte, and LaKeith Stanfield. Ramsay has spoken about making minor editorial reshapings since the film’s Cannes premiere in May, refining the rhythm without altering the core. What remains is a portrait of a woman disintegrating—not melodramatically, but incrementally. A sentence that trails off. A glass left half-full. A gaze that lingers too long on the baby, as if trying to recognize something that should feel familiar but doesn’t.
There is a moment—perhaps thirty minutes in—where Lawrence’s character stands in front of a bathroom mirror, touching her face as if it belongs to someone else. The camera holds. No music. Just the faint hum of fluorescent lighting and the sound of her breathing. It is the kind of mise-en-scène Bresson would recognize: economy of gesture, maximum emotional weight. You feel the texture of her exhaustion, the grain of it.
Lawrence does not perform this as tragedy. She performs it as bewilderment. As rage without target. As the slow, creeping horror of realizing that the body you thought was yours has been colonized by something you cannot control. It is not a showy performance. It does not announce itself. But it burrows under the skin, and it stays there. Some critics at Cannes responded with discomfort. Others with admiration. Few responded with indifference.
The question now is whether the Academy can make space for a performance this unvarnished in a year already crowded with women giving transformative work. Jessie Buckley in Wicked Little Letters is magnetic. Renate Reinsve in The Worst Person in the World follow-up continues her trajectory as one of the most emotionally transparent actors working today. Emma Stone is Emma Stone. Rose Byrne is overdue. Cynthia Erivo carries the weight of Wicked on her shoulders. Lawrence is competing not just for attention, but for emotional bandwidth. And Die My Love does not make it easy.
MUBI’s Strategy: Visibility Over Volume
MUBI is not trying to replicate The Substance‘s box office. That would be impossible. The Substance was a body horror phenomenon, a film that crossed over from arthouse curiosity to cultural conversation. Die My Love is quieter, stranger, more interior. It is a film about the mind eating itself, shot with Ramsay’s signature blend of beauty and brutality—every frame feels like it was composed under glass, fragile and precise. It does not have the same viral potential. But it does have Oscar potential—if MUBI plays it right.
The wide release strategy is about creating the appearance of momentum. It signals to Academy voters that this is not a niche festival film destined for streaming obscurity. It is a theatrical event. It is being taken seriously. And in an Oscar race where perception often matters as much as performance, that positioning is crucial. MUBI is betting that voters will respond to Ramsay’s auteur credentials, Lawrence’s commitment, and the film’s unflinching portrayal of postpartum psychosis—a subject rarely treated with this level of psychological rigor in mainstream cinema.
But the risk is real. If the film underperforms theatrically—and early tracking suggests it will open modestly—then the narrative shifts. Suddenly, it becomes “the MUBI film that couldn’t find an audience.” And that makes it easier for voters to overlook. The Academy loves a success story. It loves a film that fought for attention and won. It is far less enthusiastic about films that arrive with critical praise but no cultural footprint.
The Best Actress Race: A Stacked Deck
Lawrence has to knock out one of five women to make it into the final Best Actress lineup. Jessie Buckley. Renate Reinsve. Emma Stone. Rose Byrne. Cynthia Erivo. That is not a weak field. That is a gauntlet.
Buckley has been building momentum for years, delivering one emotionally exposed performance after another. Reinsve broke through with The Worst Person in the World and has not lost a step. Stone is a two-time Oscar winner who continues to take risks. Byrne has been undervalued for so long that voters may decide this is her year. And Erivo carries the cultural weight of Wicked, a film that will dominate conversations for months.
Lawrence’s advantage is name recognition and the fact that she has not been nominated since 2016. There is a narrative there—”Jennifer Lawrence returns with her most daring performance yet”—that could appeal to voters who remember her as the Academy’s golden girl. But that narrative only works if the performance is undeniable. And while Lawrence’s work in Die My Love is extraordinary, it is also abrasive. It does not flatter. It does not comfort. And that makes it vulnerable.
The Academy has shown, in recent years, that it is willing to reward difficult performances—Olivia Colman in The Favourite, Frances McDormand in Three Billboards. But those performances existed in films that gave voters permission to enjoy the difficulty. They were laced with humor, with wit, with a certain distance that made the darkness palatable. Die My Love offers no such distance. It sits with you, unblinking. And not every voter will want to sit with it.
Netflix’s Parallel Campaign: Frankenstein, Train Dreams, and the Industry Vote
Elsewhere in the Oscar race, Netflix is making moves. Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein is rising among Academy voters, particularly as it enters its first weekend of streaming. Del Toro’s name alone carries weight, but the film itself—lavish, emotionally earnest, visually sumptuous—is the kind of thing voters respond to. It is ambitious without being alienating. Grand without being cold.
Train Dreams, meanwhile, is building quiet momentum for Best Actor and Best Adapted Screenplay. Clint Bentley and Greg Kwedar have crafted something tender and lived-in, the kind of film that sneaks up on you. It does not announce itself. But it lingers. And in a crowded field, that lingering quality can be the difference between a nomination and being forgotten.
Jay Kelly is playing well with hometown industry voters, particularly in its portrayal of the Los Angeles film ecosystem. It is up against Sentimental Value, Joachim Trier’s Norwegian industry film, which has a similar meta-textual appeal but less cultural proximity to the Academy. A House of Dynamite has struggled despite strong streaming numbers on Netflix—a reminder that visibility does not always translate to prestige.
What this means for Die My Love is that the landscape is crowded. Netflix has the resources to keep its films in the conversation. MUBI does not. It has passion. It has taste. But it does not have the money to blanket voters with screenings and events. It has to rely on the film’s quality and Lawrence’s name to carry the campaign. That is a gamble. But it is the only gamble MUBI can make.
What Happens Next
The next few weeks will determine whether Die My Love has real Oscar legs or fades into the “admired but overlooked” category. MUBI will continue to push the film theatrically, hoping that word-of-mouth and critical praise create enough momentum to sustain a campaign. Lawrence will likely do press, carefully navigating the line between promoting her performance and not overselling the film’s difficulty. Ramsay, who is notoriously private, may or may not engage with the Oscar circuit. Her presence could help. Her absence could hurt.
But the real test is whether voters can separate their discomfort with the film from their admiration for the craft. Because Die My Love is not an easy watch. It is not designed to be. It is a film about a woman who cannot recognize herself in the mirror, made by a director who refuses to look away. And that refusal is both its greatest strength and its greatest liability.
If the Academy is feeling brave, Lawrence makes it in. If they are feeling cautious, she does not. And either way, the film will endure—on MUBI’s platform, in repertory screenings, in the memory of anyone who has ever felt like a stranger in their own body. That is the thing about Ramsay’s work. It does not need awards to matter. But it would not hurt to have them.
You leave the theater—or will, when you see it—the way you leave any Ramsay film: the world outside unchanged, but you, irreversibly altered.
What You Need to Know About ‘Die My Love’ and Its Oscar Campaign
MUBI’s Widest Release Since The Substance
The film is getting a nationwide theatrical release without the traditional platform rollout, signaling MUBI’s commitment to building Oscar momentum and subscriber interest.
Jennifer Lawrence’s Most Confrontational Performance Since mother!
Shot while pregnant with her second child, Lawrence delivers a raw, abrasive portrayal of postpartum psychosis that divides as much as it captivates—rendered in muted greens and grays that suggest nausea more than nature.
A Brutal Best Actress Field
Lawrence faces competition from Jessie Buckley, Renate Reinsve, Emma Stone, Rose Byrne, and Cynthia Erivo—all delivering transformative work in a crowded race.
Minor Editorial Changes Since Cannes
Ramsay refined the film’s rhythm after its May premiere, tightening the emotional and narrative focus without altering its unflinching core.
Netflix Competes with Frankenstein and Train Dreams
Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein is rising among Academy voters, while Train Dreams builds quiet momentum for Best Actor and Adapted Screenplay nominations.
FAQ
Why is Die My Love considered Oscar-worthy despite its difficulty?
Because the Academy occasionally rewards performances that challenge rather than comfort—if the craft is undeniable and the timing is right. Lawrence’s work here is both, but the competition is fierce.
Can MUBI sustain an Oscar campaign without Netflix-level resources?
It is harder. But The Substance proved that a targeted campaign built on critical praise and cultural conversation can break through. Die My Love needs that same kind of grassroots momentum to survive.
How does the Best Actress race affect Lawrence’s chances?
It makes her vulnerable. In a weaker year, she would be a lock. But with Buckley, Reinsve, Stone, Byrne, and Erivo all delivering career-defining work, every vote counts. And abrasive performances are harder to champion.
What role does Lynne Ramsay’s reputation play in the campaign?
Ramsay is one of the most respected auteurs working today. But she has never been an Oscar darling. Her films are too uncompromising, too willing to alienate. That respect matters, but it does not guarantee votes.
