diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index 1be08ac..46da2e0 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
 [tool.poetry]
 name = "mistral_common"
-version = "1.4.3"
+version = "1.4.4"
 description = ""
 authors = ["bam4d <bam4d@mistral.ai>"]
 readme = "README.md"
diff --git a/src/mistral_common/__init__.py b/src/mistral_common/__init__.py
index aa56ed4..c0f285b 100644
--- a/src/mistral_common/__init__.py
+++ b/src/mistral_common/__init__.py
@@ -1 +1 @@
-__version__ = "1.4.3"
+__version__ = "1.4.4"
diff --git a/src/mistral_common/tokens/tokenizers/multimodal.py b/src/mistral_common/tokens/tokenizers/multimodal.py
index 153aadd..0498213 100644
--- a/src/mistral_common/tokens/tokenizers/multimodal.py
+++ b/src/mistral_common/tokens/tokenizers/multimodal.py
@@ -1,4 +1,5 @@
 import base64
+import logging
 from dataclasses import dataclass
 from io import BytesIO
 from typing import Tuple, Union
@@ -14,6 +15,9 @@
     SpecialImageIDs,
 )
 
+logger = logging.getLogger(__name__)
+
+
 _cv2_installed: bool
 try:
     import cv2
@@ -21,6 +25,14 @@
     _cv2_installed = True
 except ImportError:
     _cv2_installed = False
+except Exception as e:
+    # cv2 has lots of import problems: https://github.com/opencv/opencv-python/issues/884
+    # for better UX, let's simply skip all errors that might arise from import for now
+    logger.warning(
+        f"Warning: Your installation of OpenCV appears to be broken: {e}."
+        "Please follow the instructions at https://github.com/opencv/opencv-python/issues/884 "
+        "to correct your environment. The import of cv2 has been skipped."
+    )
 
 
 def is_cv2_installed() -> bool: