The Brutalist
Starring: Adrien Brody, Guy Pierce, Felicity Jones, Joe Alwyn
Directed By: Brady Corbet
The Brutalist is a sprawling epic detailing the dark side of the American dream through the lens of a Hungarian architect after surviving the horrors of World War II.
Directed by Brady Corbet, the film is massive in both scale and run-time. An intermission separates the first and second half, making the film clock in at three hours and thirty four minutes.
The Brutalist follows Lazslo Toth (Adrian Brody), a Jewish immigrant from Budapest making his way to Pittsburg to find work and chase the American dream. What he thought would be the land of opportunity meets him with many more challenges than he anticipated. He encounters a strange client, Harrison Lee Van Burren (Guy Pierce), who wants to hire him. But Van Buren is unpredictable and increasingly odd. Can Toth’s work find success in America despite various roadblocks?
I am going to be a contrarian here. I really didn’t love this movie like the majority of critics. I thought Corbet’s last release Vox Lux was extremely bold and impressive. Sure, it was divisive but its swing-for-the-fences approach was wildly entertaining with talking points for days.
Aside from its electric opening sequence, The Brutalist is kind of a snooze and feels wildly derivative of several Paul Thomas Anderson works, particularly when exploring the dynamics between Toth and Van Buren. There Will Be Blood and The Master particularly came to mind while I watched this film. Obviously good art inspires other work, but both PTA films are better than The Brutalist. There is also a specific event that happens in the second act of the film that is so wildly jarring and unnecessary. The sequence is way too on the nose. It takes away from any subtlety the movie had working in its favor.
Not to completely pile on this movie but the second act after intermission is ridiculous. As moviegoers, we need to acknowledge it is wildly over-the-top. It’s as if every single possible horrible event was thrown into the script to create conflict. It gets to the point where it felt like obvious Oscar bait.
Adrian Brody is the beating heart of The Brutalist and the best part of the movie. I’m now seeing news that his Hungarian accent was perfected with AI, so I don’t even know how much was real anymore. What I saw on screen was a very believable and emotional performance as Toth. He’s a wounded man who desperately wants to achieve the American Dream. All those dreams come crashing down when he sees the harsh reality of the immigrant experience in America.
Guy Pearce is the wealthy and enigmatic Van Buren. He is seemingly kind one moment and terrifying the next. He is a false friend to Toth, a dynamic that parallels Toth’s vision of the American Dream - a facade that beacons him, only to reveal its true nature after he is in too deep.
Felicity Jones’ character is very odd in this movie. I am a fan of her as an actress but her accent work is very strange. As Erzabeth she is constantly creating conflict. If there’s no conflict, she’s going to make some. The movie takes on a totally different tone when she steps in and unfortunately, it’s not for the best. I appreciate what her character does in the final act but it felt as though the filmmakers did not know how to handle her character at times.
The Brutalist contains some impressive performances and technically great filmmaking, but the chaotic second act and overly bloated runtime left me feeling it’s massively overhyped.
My Rating: 6/10