QUICK AND DIRTY: LIVE FROM TALLINN

Told across two chapters (1947-1952 The Enigma of Arrival and 1953-1960 The Hardcore of Beauty) and an epilogue, Corbet’s monumental film revolves around the Hungarian-born Jewish architect, László Tóth, played by Adrien Brody, who emigrated to the US in 1947. His wife Erzsébet (Felicity Jones) and mute orphaned niece Zsófia (Raffey Cassidy) would later join him when Tóth found favour with the wealthy industrialist Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce).

The film’s title refers to the style of architecture Tóth practiced, but it can be repurposed to effectively describe the laborious experience its three hours and 35-minute run time subjects its audience to. Across his three feature films, Corbet is attempting to bludgeon or forcefully mould cinema into his specific and personal vision. For this, he should be admired because he’s proactively exploring the limitations of the form and interrogating what cinema can and should be. This approach, however, does not make his films an easy experience and compels contradictory emotions of admiration and dislike, even contempt.

Corbet is deeply attentive towards the craft of filmmaking and in The Childhood of a Leader (2015), Vox Lux (2018) and now The Brutalist, he displays his sublime gift for marrying sound and image. There are few directors that possess such skill in this regard, that allows Corbet to provoke specific senses of feeling. These cannot be articulated with words; they can only be felt. Then, there’s the flawed side of his cinema that does the form a disservice. The Brutalist is a disjointed and uneven mess. Inconsistent, the moments of brilliance are undermined by the lethargic storytelling.

In the epilogue, Zsófia surrenders to the cliché: “It’s not the destination, but it’s about the journey”. Considering the runtime, and the 13-year window into Tóth’s life, we never get under the skin of the characters. They are these complex and layered objects for us to only admire from afar. The destination is a sigh of relief at the end of an underwhelming and indecisive journey. Corbet’s fatal error is that he and his cast don’t create space for the audience to enter the film. It’s an ambitious work that should be monumental but is blighted by indulgence and hubris. Corbet and his cast flex their creative muscles, overconfident in what they perceive to be their achievement. There’s something distasteful about their indifference towards the audience, who are objectified. Meanwhile, the abandonment of narrative, psychological and emotional substance is the objectification of cinema.

Corbet’s vision imbues The Brutalist with a cinematic awareness. It desperately wants to belong the type of legacy filmmaking like Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in America (1984) – a grand sweeping story that elevates the filmmaking craft. Leone’s film respects the audience and creates space for them to enter the film. Its expansive four hours and 11-minute run time is therefore emotionally affecting, bringing the past to life. Corbet, however, fails in the rudimentary aspects of the filmmaking craft. His search for the sublime compromises the integrity of the film and his quest to walk with cinematic giants ends disastrously. As for The Brutalist, it winds up being a patronising and discourteous work to both its subject the audience.

The Brutalist screened in the Screen International Critics’ Choice of the 28th Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival.