“The Brutalist” has all the momentum it can handle right now: Golden Globe wins, 10 Oscar nominations and an expanding release that’s allowing more people to see the historical epic in theaters — just as the VistaVision-shot film was intended.
But one thing the 3-hour, 35-minute movie (with a 15-minute intermission) doesn’t have is a director who’s resting on his laurels. Colorado native Brady Corbet, who helmed the picture and co-wrote it with director and partner Mona Fastvold, has already started writing his next film — even while “The Brutalist” is sprinting its way through awards territory.
The new movie will be a horror-Western set in the 1970s, and it’s not hard to imagine it’ll further trace themes of trauma, immigration and generational upheaval, following Corbet-directed films such as 2015’s “The Childhood of a Leader” and 2018’s “Vox Lux,” starring Natalie Portman.
As a former actor who appeared in acclaimed films and TV series like “Funny Games,” “24,” and “Martha Marcy May Marlene,” Corbet knows that patting oneself on the back can be the death of art.
“I’m always sort of pivoting because I never want to repeat myself, even though I am investigating these themes that are absolutely related,” the 36-year-old said this week during a video interview. “I think ‘The Brutalist’ certainly was a response to ‘Vox Lux.’ ”
“Vox Lux,” which screened at the 2018 Denver Film Festival as its closing title, is a dark, willfully garish fable about pop stardom and the emptiness of fame, with original music by Grammy-nominated artist Sia. It featured a first-act depiction of a school shooting that was influenced by the Columbine massacre in 1999 — and that drove away dozens of shocked audience members, having not been warned the film would include that.
Corbet had a lot of family in the audience that night, he said, and his Colorado connections remain strong, having grown up in Glenwood Springs. And yet, that’s not enough to bring him back here for new projects.
“After ‘Vox Lux,’ I decided I didn’t want to make any more movies in the U.S.,” he said. That was mostly due to red tape and restrictions — including in Colorado, where tax-rebate film incentives remain significantly lower than neighboring states such as New Mexico and Utah — and not necessarily the reception of “Vox Lux.”
Born in Scottsdale, Ariz., and raised in Glenwood by his single mother, Corbet is among a growing swath of major directors who grew up here or have Colorado roots. (See Oscar winners and nominees such as Lee Isaac Chung, Rian Johnson, Scott Derrickson, Chris Sanders, and Jon Watts).
“It’s really sad to say that, because you can’t imagine how happy I would be to come shoot a movie in Colorado,” he said. “But for many, many reasons, it’s just not financially viable.”
“The Brutalist,” which begins in 1947, was shot mostly in Hungary — including its U.S.-set scenes, which comprise much of the film. It follows the Hungarian-born, Bauhaus-trained architect László Tóth as he’s torn away from his family in postwar Europe and heads to America to rebuild, literally and figuratively, while navigating racism, heroin addiction, family decay and threats to his artistic integrity.
Suffused with postwar anxiety and implicit Holocaust trauma, it’s by turns insightful and tragic, but always gorgeous in its carven, chilly way. When wealthy industrialist Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce) enters the picture and commissions a major project from Tóth, we see not just his architectural brilliance but also visceral scenes of love and abuse.
The movie’s Oscars chances are high, with nominations for best picture, best director and acting nods for star Adrien Brody, Pearce and Felicity Jones (who plays Tóth’s wife, Erzsébet). With a good chunk of the dialogue in Hungarian (and using AI to smooth it, which has caused a spark of controversy of late), it feels like an authentic portrait of a person and his people.
“I’m only familiar with the folks on my mother’s side of the family, but her mother comes from an Irish Catholic family and background,” Corbet said, noting that he attended a Catholic school while growing up. “However, my father’s entire family comes from Hungary.”
“With (‘The Brutalist’) I was very interested in how men and women of the 1950s were not very expressive,” he added. “My grandfather passed away a couple of years ago, and he was the loveliest, sweetest man. But he very rarely spoke about his time in the second world war. It wasn’t until I got older that I realized how traumatic it must have been for so many years to fear the potential loss of life and be faced with the horrors of war.”
Corbet has a 10-year-old daughter, Ada, who sobbed on the Golden Globes telecast earlier this month when her father gave a rousing speech after winning best director. “The Brutalist” also won best picture at that ceremony, among others. (He told The Associated Press: “I was pretty moved to see the person I love more than anything in the world (in the audience). I’ve never seen her cry from joy before, so it was very touching.”)
When Corbet began making “The Brutalist,” Ada was only 3 years old. After making it, Corbet said he appreciates being a father all the more, as well as his own, complex family history.
“I usually try not to interpret a movie for people, because you don’t want to ruin the experience,” he said. “But for me, my character (played by Brody) is imbued with a little bit of my grandfather, because he doesn’t express himself verbally. He expresses himself with his gestures, and expresses his trauma and what he’s been through by the creation of this structure, which I think is very poetic.”
“The Brutalist” is also notable for having been filmed largely in the old-school celluloid format of VistaVision, a pre-digital, high-definition technology that emerged in the late 1950s. The widescreen, 35mm format prefigured IMAX and other high-density imagery in a way that still stuns on screen.
“Some extraordinary filmmakers have reached out to me, like Alfonso Cuarón, Christopher Nolan, Denis Villeneuve and many others, and I’ve been extremely touched,” Corbet said of his decision to champion celluloid. He’s already planning to shoot his next film on 8-perf 65mm film — about three-and-half times larger than the standard 35mm.
“I didn’t consult with any filmmakers, but I probably should have,” he laughed. “But my cinematographer Lol Crawley had worked with it before. He actually loaded film on the (Star Wars prequel) ‘The Phantom Menace’ for visual effects. Even some shots in ‘Poor Things’ (shot by Robbie Ryan) are in VistaVision, so it’s not like it totally fell out of fashion. People just don’t it use that often in the way we used it.”
The unforgiving format gives cavernous space to shots of stark buildings but also ornately appointed mansions and threadbare apartments. Still, its clarity prompted Corbet to use 16 mm film in some montages and then blow it up to 70 mm for exhibition.
Why else do we go to the movies if not for the gorgeous, enthralling spectacle?
“I really believe the future of the medium is large format,” Corbet said. “It gives people a reason to get up off of the couch, and I’m just like them. Movie (tickets) are expensive. I’ve got mouths to feed, and unless you make it worth my while, I don’t want to waste my time.”