At this time of year, with festival and awards season is full swing, you hear about a lot of movies that critics can’t stop raving about. Some of the praise is justified, some is…well, a bit overblown. So where does Brady Corbet’s 3 1/2-hour historical epic The Brutalist fall? Since premiering in Venice, many have been calling it the best movie of the year, and A24 hopes those accolades continue with the debut of the first trailer.
Directed by Corbet who co-wrote the screenplay with his regular partner, Mona Fastvold, The Brutalist stars Adrien Brody as László Tóth, a Hungarian-Jewish architect who survives the Holocaust, and moves with his wife to the United States to experience the American Dream.
Perhaps because he was an actor himself, Corbet has never had an issue attracting phenomenal casts. Felicity Jones, Joe Alwyn, Guy Pearce, Stacy Martin, Alessandro Nivola, Isaach de Bankolé, and Raffey Cassidy co-star with Brody.
Since his directorial debut in 2015, Corbet has only directed challenging, buzzy films including The Childhood of a Leader and Vox Lux.
SYNOPSIS: Escaping post-war Europe, visionary architect László Toth arrives in America to rebuild his life, his work, and his marriage to his wife Erzsébet after being forced apart during wartime by shifting borders and regimes. On his own in a strange new country, László settles in Pennsylvania, where the wealthy and prominent industrialist Harrison Lee Van Buren recognizes his talent for building. But power and legacy come at a heavy cost…
I just skipped this one at Middleburg because of the runtime, but it’s near the top of my list of must-see films for the rest of the year.
A24 will release The Brutalist on December 20th.
