The Brutalist
A24 (2024)
This isn't a movie that I had a lot of interest in seeing when I first heard about it, but it's sitting at a 93% critics and 80% fans score on Rotten Tomatoes and it was just nominated for Best Picture, so I had to check it out while it's still on the big screen.
Apparently, I was the only person in town who felt this way... at least at 11:00 am on a Sunday morning. In fairness, it's a three and a half hour long movie, so I can understand why there wasn't a line of folks beating down the door to the place. It worked out perfectly for me though. The movie ended with plenty of time to get out and enjoy the rest of the afternoon and evening, and I had a whole theater all to myself.
This movie has a 15 minute intermission at around the 100 minute mark to allow moviegoers to get up, and stretch their legs before the first and second half of the film. I was in a position to be able to run laps around the chairs throughout the entire duration of the film without disturbing anybody if I really wanted to, but the break still came in handy because I really had to hit up the restroom.
If you've gotten the sense that I'm tapdancing around this screening without saying anything about the film, you would be correct. I'm not really sure how to explain what I think of The Brutalist, but I'll try my best.
First of all, this film is a work of art. It's beautifully filmed. The performances are some of the best that I've seen in a long time. The score is perfect. The plot moves along at a good pace without any moments where it feels like it's dragging. I can absolutely see why it was nominated for Best Picture. Despite all of this, I'm not sure that I can say that I enjoyed it all that much. The turning point in the film for me came when we get to 1958. From that point on, it felt like it started going off the rails a bit and tried to go in too many directions at the same time. I'm pretty sure that Harry and Maggie's reaction in the final scene before the epilogue is meant to imply that first hand experiences that lead them to believe what Erzsébet said at the dinner party, whether they can admit it or not, but then it just kind of... goes nowhere. Similarly, I know that the speech that Zsófia gives in the 1980 epilogue is meant to carry a lot of emotional weight, but it just kind of fell flat for me. I mean, I get it. It makes sense, but... it just really didn't make me feel much of anything. Granted, I'm not the right audience member to feel the full weight of that speech, but it just kind of make me say "oh... alright... so that's why he was so insistent about the dimensions... how about that".
I feel about this movie much the same as I felt about Oppenheimer in 2023. I'm glad that I got to experience both of them on the big screen. I recognize the quality of both works and that a theatrical setting brings out the best in movies like these, but I also know I'd never be able to pay attention to either of them if I watched them at home. It also reminds me of last year's Best Picture winner in that I have no desire to ever see it again, and I'm not sure that I'd recommend it to anyone in my friend group other than the cinephiles who I'm sure have already seen it anyway (you know who you are).
I'm not sure if this makes sense to anyone but me, but... there. That's how I feel about The Brutalist. If it were up to me, I would still give Anora the Academy Award for Best Picture, but if I had to put money on it, I'd bet that The Brutalist is going to sweep every category that it has been nominated in.
