THE BRUTALIST: 2024 (Max) I Directed by Brady Corbet (Melancholia, Vox Lux), with a script co-written by Corbet and Mona Fastvold, The Brutalist is a harrowing epic that follows the life of a Hungarian-born Jewish architect and Holocaust survivor, named László Tóth. ough the movie lost out on the 2025 Oscar for Best Picture (which went to Anora), but Adrain Brody did win for Best Actor. I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. The story is this: Escaping post-war Europe, visionary architect László Toth (Adriann Brody) 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, is marred by illness. On his own in a strange new country, László settles in Pennsylvania, where the wealthy and prominent industrialist Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce) recognizes his talent for building and hires him to buiid a community center. But power and legacy come at a heavy cost. First, the movie is too long—3 hours and 35 minutes. That’s too long! Second, Gary and I didn’t like very much, but maybe the length had something to do with that. The movie is not based on a true story, none of the characters are based on real people. Adrien Brody’s character, László Tóth, is not based on one specific real-life architect. Guy Pearce’s character, Harrison Lee Van Buren, is not based on any specific, real-life wealthy industrialist. The story you see play out on screen between the two characters is made up. That said, The Brutalist is a historical fiction drama inspired by the post-war architectural style known as Brutalist architecture, and the way it was inspired and shaped by the Holocaust. In an interview with Adrian Brody for NPR, the star said that one key reference for the movie was real-life Hungarian-German Jewish modernist architect, Marcel Breuer, who immigrated to the United States in 1937. So, unlike Brody’s character, Breuer was able to escape before the Holocaust. We can’t give this movie a high grade, although the Epigram was touching. I say C+ and Gary says D.  GRADE C+/D