MOVIE REVIEW – Brady Corbet’s third feature film is a striking and monumental creation, with Adrien Brody delivering a compelling portrayal of a visionary architect. Felicity Jones embodies his strong-willed yet tragically fated wife, while Guy Pearce portrays the manipulative billionaire funding his ambitious project. The story explores themes of ambition, power, and the inevitability of destruction, offering a fresh perspective on the interplay between architecture and the human spirit.

If you’re going to watch just one wildly ambitious, deeply allegorical film this year about an architect shaping the future, let it be The Brutalist. To put it simply: choose The Brutalist over Francis Ford Coppola’s Megalopolis. While Coppola’s film begins with promise, it veers into aimless meandering after about an hour. Why Coppola, the master of classical New Hollywood, thought he could reinvent himself as an avant-garde trailblazer remains a mystery. In the end, Megalopolis amounts to little more than glittering fragments.

At the Crossroads of Architecture and Destruction

In The Brutalist, Brady Corbet takes a completely different approach. His first two films, the allegorical The Childhood of a Leader (2015) and the dark exploration of pop culture Vox Lux (2018), showed flashes of brilliance but often faltered in self-indulgence. By contrast, The Brutalist is a more polished and restrained yet utterly breathtaking work. Clocking in at three hours and 15 minutes, the film’s tight pacing and emotional depth leave little room for boredom as it chronicles the life of László Tóth (Adrien Brody), a Hungarian-Jewish architect who emigrates to America after World War II. Corbet handles the narrative with the gravitas of a biographical drama.

If László’s name sounds familiar, it’s because he shares it with a Hungarian-born Australian geologist who famously attacked Michelangelo’s Pietà with a hammer in 1972. While this might seem like an inside joke, the deeper symbolism is impossible to ignore. This choice underscores the intimate connection between creation and destruction — a reminder that a brilliant creator is, in some ways, always a destroyer.

I’ve never been overly impressed with Adrien Brody’s Oscar-winning performance in The Pianist. He seemed to coast through that role, and the film itself left little impression. But in The Brutalist, Brody takes on another Holocaust survivor — László arrives in America via Ellis Island, seeking a fresh start. This time, Brody delivers a profoundly moving performance, infusing even the quietest moments with emotional depth.

A Broken Nose, a Stark Sex Scene, and a Glimpse of the Future

László initially comes across as almost invisible, his heavy accent and cautious demeanor marking him as a desperate refugee simply trying to survive. Yet from the outset, Corbet signals that this is no typical immigrant story. A stunning side-angle shot of the Statue of Liberty, as László steps out from the ship’s cramped and grim interior, sets the tone. What follows is a jarring sex scene—not shocking because László hires a prostitute, but because Corbet’s raw and unflinching depiction strips the act of any pretense. “Your face is ugly,” the woman says. “I know,” replies László with resignation. This moment hints at the buried vitality and darker layers within him.

During the voyage, László broke his nose and turned to heroin to numb the pain — a habit that becomes a secret but functional part of his life. This self-destructive streak reveals a deeper facet of his character, serving as both a foundation for his ambitions and a source of his tragedy.

Arriving in Pennsylvania, László seeks refuge with his cousin, Attila (Alessandro Nivola), a smooth-talking furniture maker with a shop full of custom designs. Attila offers László a room in the back of his store, creating a makeshift sense of family alongside his WASP wife, Audrey (Emma Laird). However, Audrey quickly emerges as the film’s first harbinger of betrayal, foreshadowing the conflicts to come.

Soon after, László receives an unusual commission: Harry Lee (Joe Alwyn), the son of a local tycoon, wants to transform his father’s neglected reading room into a modern library as a surprise gift. The project is entrusted to László. At this stage, little is known about his past, but the library he designs—with hidden shelves, diagonal slats, a luminous skylight, and a central chair worthy of Mies van der Rohe—is a stunning vision of architectural innovation.

When Harry’s father, Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce), sees what has been done to his beloved room, he erupts in rage. László and Attila are thrown out of the house without full payment. Eventually, it becomes clear that Van Buren’s fury stems from his need for control and the grief over his dying mother. The library, which earns a feature in Look magazine, becomes a design milestone. Soon after, Van Buren reaches out to László, not only to pay him but to propose a partnership — to build something that will define the future.

A Partnership That’s More Than Business

Guy Pearce shines as Van Buren, delivering a performance that ranks among his most memorable. With wavy hair, a commanding mustache, and a booming voice, he channels a mix of Clark Gable and Charles Foster Kane. The dynamic between László and Van Buren is layered with tension: artist and patron, immigrant and aristocrat, subordinate and exploiter. Yet their bond eventually evolves into something far darker. “You stimulate me intellectually,” Van Buren declares, fixing his unnerving gaze on László. Rarely has a compliment carried such ominous undertones.

While The Brutalist delves into rich emotional and narrative territory, Corbet reminds us that this is also an ambitious art film. The stark opening credits echo the austerity of Tár. Divided into chapters with evocative titles like “The Enigma of Arrival,” the film even features a 15-minute intermission accompanied by a modernist piano solo.

The first half of the story feels like a tale of triumph. We learn that László was a prominent Bauhaus-inspired brutalist architect in Hungary. His bold, concrete designs were meant to endure, and that’s exactly what Van Buren wants: a combined auditorium, gymnasium, library, and chapel made of concrete and Italian marble — a luxurious monument to stand tall in Doylestown, Pennsylvania. At a cost of $850,000, such an expense in the 1950s was nothing short of regal.

The Cost of Art: Dreams, Sacrifices, and Hard Choices

The second half introduces Erzsébet (Felicity Jones), László’s wife, who arrives in a wheelchair, the result of osteoporosis caused by malnutrition during her time in a concentration camp. László longs for their reunion, but Erzsébet, with her Old World pride and unyielding spirit, shatters his illusions. Far from being a sanctuary, their marriage becomes another source of complexity in László’s life.

The construction drama borrows equally from The Fountainhead and There Will Be Blood. It’s not just a building but an American crusade, fraught with beauty and peril. Financial resources dwindle, and László’s willingness to forgo his salary is the first sign that he’s in too deep. Meanwhile, Erzsébet’s niece Zsofia (Raffey Cassidy) arrives, adding tension when Van Buren’s son Harry develops a troubling interest in her.

The relationship between László and Van Buren grows increasingly symbiotic and confrontational, culminating in a visually arresting sequence at Italian marble quarries. Here, Van Buren commits a heinous act that is both shocking and heavily symbolic. Perhaps too symbolic.

What is The Brutalist ultimately about? It’s an inherently American story of immigration and ambition, as well as an exploration of what it means to be an artist. Yet it also delves into Jewish identity in a world fraught with ambivalence toward Judaism. At times, this theme feels overly pronounced, perhaps because the era depicted was one of rapid assimilation for American Jews. It’s clear that Corbet set out to say something monumental with this film. Whether he succeeded is up to the viewer. What’s certain is that The Brutalist feels like watching a man’s entire life unfold before your eyes — and that, in itself, is profound.

-Gergely Herpai “BadSector”-