There are bands that soundtrack an era, and there are bands that somehow outlive the one they helped invent. Pulp belong firmly in the latter category.
More than thirty years after they turned kitchen-sink observation into pop mythology, Jarvis Cocker and company are back at the centre of the cultural conversation — not through nostalgia, but through reinvention.
heir latest chapter arrives via PULP: WHAT DO YOU DO FOR AN ENCORE?, a new feature-length documentary directed by Garth Jennings that premieres exclusively on MUBI in Autumn/Fall 2026.
Part concert film, part archival excavation, the 90-minute feature traces Pulp’s evolution from Sheffield outsiders to unlikely standard-bearers of British cool. But this isn’t a straightforward victory lap. Jennings, whose career has moved effortlessly between cult British cinema, blockbuster animation and music video experimentation, approaches the band’s history with the restless energy of someone more interested in momentum than memorialisation.
“In the spirit of Stop Making Sense and The Last Waltz, filmmaker Garth Jennings (Sing, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Son of Rambow) crafts a kinetic new 90 minute movie, charting Pulp’s extraordinary journey from obscurity to cultural touchstone.”
The film combines footage from Pulp‘s biggest-ever arena performance — staged during the worldwide tour supporting MORE, the band’s first album in 24 years — with four decades of previously unseen archival material. The result promises less a museum exhibit than a living document of a group that has always thrived in contradiction: glamorous yet awkward, arch yet sincere, detached yet deeply emotional.
“It fuses the brilliantly choreographed stage spectacle of Pulp’s biggest ever arena show – part of the global tour for MORE, the band’s first album in 24 years – with four decades of colourful, never-seen-before archival material.”
At its centre is Jarvis Cocker: frontman, narrator and one of British culture’s great observers. His voice has long occupied a peculiar space in the national imagination — equal parts art-school philosopher, pop star and curious neighbour peering through the curtains of everyday life.
“Narrated by Pulp’s frontman, Jarvis Cocker and featuring twenty songs – hits and deep cuts – this movie is Pulp and Garth’s spectacular answer to the question, ‘What do you do for an encore?’, and a vibrant tribute to a band of brilliant misfits, whose unique blend of irony, rebellion, and razor-sharp social commentary resonated with generations of listeners and helped define an era of British culture.”
It’s difficult to overstate what Pulp represented. Formed in Sheffield in 1978 by a teenage Cocker, the band spent years hovering at the margins before becoming one of the defining acts of the 1990s. Their songs transformed class anxiety, sexual awkwardness and suburban aspiration into something theatrical and strangely universal. If Britpop often celebrated swagger, Pulp made an art form out of uncertainty.
Jennings understands that instinctively.
Long before directing billion-dollar animated hits like Sing and Sing 2, he built his reputation alongside producer Nick Goldsmith through Hammer & Tongs, crafting era-defining videos for Blur, Radiohead, Beck, R.E.M., Fatboy Slim and Vampire Weekend. He later directed The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy and the beloved coming-of-age film Son of Rambow. More recently, he has become a key collaborator in Pulp’s return, directing the band’s live shows during both their 2023 and 2025 world tours.
The creative team surrounding the project reflects MUBI’s increasing ambition as both producer and distributor. PULP: WHAT DO YOU DO FOR AN ENCORE? is edited by Barney Pilling (The Grand Budapest Hotel, Mrs. Harris Goes to Paris), and produced by Octavia Peissel for Opal Films alongside Danny Gabai, Amy Rattray and Paul Dugdale. Executive producers include Stuart Goldstein, Tom Healy and Rosie Taylor for VICE Studios, Harper Simon, Mark Sainsbury, Jarvis Cocker and Jeanette Lee.
The documentary also arrives during a period of expansion for MUBI itself. Once known primarily as a carefully curated streaming platform for cinephiles, the company has evolved into one of contemporary cinema’s most influential players, backing projects from filmmakers including Lynne Ramsay, Paolo Sorrentino, Joachim Trier, Park Chan-wook and Sofia Coppola.
That a film about Pulp should find its home there feels oddly perfect.
Pulp have always existed slightly outside the obvious narrative. Too strange to be conventional pop stars, too successful to remain cult figures, they transformed social observation into spectacle and discomfort into glamour. They chronicled Britain while refusing to romanticise it.
So perhaps the title isn’t simply rhetorical.
After reunion tours, after cultural canonisation, after becoming shorthand for an entire period of British life, what exactly do you do for an encore?
You make the story stranger. You revisit the archive. You put on the biggest show of your career. You let Jarvis Cocker narrate.
And, if this film is to be believed, you keep dancing anyway.
PULP: WHAT DO YOU DO FOR AN ENCORE? will premiere exclusively on MUBI in Autumn/Fall 2026. A release date is yet to be announced
words Al Woods
