Eddie Huang claimed in a post on Instagram July 31 that Mubi is shelving his documentary “Vice Is Broke” after the chef-turned-director spoke out yesterday against the distributor accepting a $100 million investment from a company with ties to the Israeli defense industry.
Now, Mubi is disputing Huang’s claim, telling IndieWire in a statement, “MUBI has not shelved ‘Vice Is Broke.’ We are in constructive discussions with the filmmaker and producers about the film’s release on MUBI, and will share further updates as those conversations progress.” IndieWire also understands via a source that shelving was never part of the discussion with Huang.
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But just eight hours earlier, Huang took to Instagram to say that he had received a phone call from Mubi’s president Jason Ropell saying that the film, according to Huang, is “shelved. Mubi is ceasing all promotion. They are going to stop payment on the film. They are going to give it back… and say do what you will.”
The impetus for this alleged call was Huang taking to Instagram the day earlier, July 30, and writing that he strongly protested Mubi’s association with investor Sequoia Capital, which has been investing in Israeli military tech companies, such as Kela, since February 2024. Sequoia partner Shaun Maguire has also come under fire in recent days for his Islamophobic posts.
“I’m a cynical person,” Huang began. “But if you had told me last October when we sold this cautionary film about private equity to Mubi — a premiere art house distributor at the time — that they would be consumed by private equity before our movie even came out, I would have told you to take the tin hat off.
“Unless Mubi addresses this situation in a satisfactory way, I cannot tell people to subscribe to this service and watch this film knowing if the service is successful it will continue to service Sequoia. I’m not being dramatic or corny. We have to start saying ‘NO.’”
“I really hope Mubi figures this out because there are great people doing creative work there. It is very unfortunate they accepted this investment. We lost another great place to make art.”
Additional reporting by Ryan Lattanzio.
