Having garnered acclaim at the Venice Film Festival, director Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist has been snapped up by A24 in a deal reportedly worth $10m.
Period architecture epic The Brutalist made a splash at the Venice Film Festival in early September, prompting acclaim from critics and a standing ovation that is said to have lasted a hand-punishing 12 minutes. A week later, Brady Corbet (Vox Lux) was handed the Silver Lion award for best director (Pedro Almadovar took the top prize, the Golden Lion, for his drama The Room Next Door).
The applause and plaudits have since attracted boutique production company A24, which, per Variety, has snapped up The Brutalist’s US distribution rights in a deal worth a reported $10m, or a shade under that sum. Corbet’s movie therefore joins a catalogue of lauded films including Moonlight (A24’s debut), Everything Everywhere All At Once, Talk To Me and this year’s Civil War.
The Brutalist is big in a distinctly Old Hollywood sort of way. Its events span the course of 30 years, and follow the progress of Laszlo Toth (Adrien Brody), a Jewish architect who survives the Holocaust and moves from his native Hungary to New York, where a contract with New York millionaire Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce) alters the course of his career. The Brutalist was also printed on 70mm film, runs for over two and a half hours, and had to be transported to the festival in roughly 10 weighty metal canisters. Like we said, it’s big.
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A24 has previously talked about changing its strategy in order to accommodate more mainstream, action-led fare. Its acquisition of The Brutalist suggests it’s still unafraid to take on films that take creative swings, and the deal should mean audiences will get the opportunity to see it in a cinema, as the director clearly intended, rather than it going straight to a streaming service.
The film’s hefty duration saw Corbet (or perhaps the Venice Film Festival’s organisers) build in a 15 minute intermission – something that will hopefully be retained for its wider release. A24 hasn’t announced a release date at this early stage, but it’s likely to be within the next few months in order to qualify for next year’s Academy Awards. When we get a UK release date, we’ll let you know.
