The Brutalist

One of the things I like the most about The Brutalist, I think, is that it is a movie that retains some of it’s secrets. 

Certainly, a lot of it drawn out right in front of you. This is an epic and I swear, almost a response to The Godfather. 

Mario Puzo had one of his characters say, right up front, “I believe in America.” 

Here Writer/Director Brady Corbet, joined by writer Mona Fastvold, begin their film with the Statue of Liberty upside down. 

Bold doesn’t do it justice. 

I think I could tell you the plot details of the rest of the movie and it would lose absolutely none of its power. 

Briefly, a Jewish immigrant and brilliant architect, played by Adrien Brody, escapes the chaos of Germany after World War 2 and starts a new life in Pennsylvania. He lives with his cousin and his cousin’s wife while awaiting word of his own wife and niece who are still trapped overseas. 

His life intersects with a powerful and wealthy family and they ultimately work together on a massive project. 

Honestly, I struggle for something to compare this to. Francis Coppola’s and Puzo’s Godfather, or There Will Be Blood, perhaps. The first section of the movie, an hour and a half or so that stops with an intermission, rumbles from one amazing scene to the next. It’s ferocious. 

This is what I came up with.

Have you seen The Deer Hunter? Director Michael Cimino and writers Quinn K. Redeker, Deric Washburn open the movie with 30 minutes at a wedding. It’s unreal in its specificity. 

Ok, one more, just because I recently watched and thought of this while typing. Terrance Malick’s Days of Heaven. I watched that entire movie and at nearly every scene I said, “My God, how did they do that?” 

That’s the first half of this. In the second half Corbet takes his foot off the gas. There is still not a bad scene in the bunch but it is not as frantic as the first section. 

Adrien Brody levitates. I assume he sent his agent and the film’s casting director all the flowers. Of course, you should not make The Brutalist without Brody. He’s just completely in his element and never makes a false move. 

For me, Guy Pearce, deserves the supporting actor award this year. Every thing he does and every story he tells builds to the denouement in a specific way. 

He’s charming and yet so obviously evil that as I watched it I kept being surprised that no one else in the movie noticed. Money can make the horrible seem respectable. Pearce never loses it or tries to soften it or shies away from this character. 

As just one example, consider the story he tells early on about his estranged grandparents. Now, having heard that story would you ever do business with this man? 

The movie draws some conclusions about America, and about the immigrant experience. It’s not wrong in its point of view. But for me, my gosh, there are big red flashing warning signs everywhere. 

As for secrets, there is a moment where a set of twins share a look, and it’s just a look, that suggests to me that their relationship is untoward. But the movie moves on. 

It does it again following an encounter with a spoiled rich man and a young immigrant woman. 

In both instances I thought there would be more. The second scene, in particular, set you up for a particular kind of finish. 

Instead, it’s a red herring that disguises what’s really about to happen. 

Or, there is truth to both things but Brody’s Laszlo Toth never learned more. And with him in the dark the audience is left wondering too. 

I love a movie that lingers as this one does. 

The film has a finale every bit as (sorry) brutal as the rest of the film. 

Then there is an epilogue that is kind of … quirky?

Certainly, while it explains some of the movie’s themes it also chooses to dance to a different tune right as the show closes. 

I am reminded of how podcaster John Siracusa describe the ending of Goodfellas. In the end, you will recall, Ray Liotta stands up in the witnesses stand, breaks the forth wall and quite literally walks the audience to the final moments of the film 

I’m paraphrasing it but Siracusa said essentially: By now Scorsese knows he has you and he can do anything he wants with you and so he does. 

If you don’t know what he means, when you get to the end of Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist you will understand.