By Angela Tricarico

Don’t be intimidated by the running time:The Brutalist is worth every minute of the three-and-a-half hours you’ll spend watching it. Nominated for 10 awards at this weekend’s Oscars, The Brutalist is a new American epic from director Brady Corbet. The film itself is a feat as ambitious as its main character, the fictional architect László Tóth (Adrien Brody), a Bauhaus-educated architect who survived the Holocaust and set sail for America in search of a better life — and that elusive American Dream. Tóth spends years struggling to get by, until a wealthy industrialist with ambitions of his own (an excellent Guy Pearce) enters Tóth’s orbit and changes his life forever. Actors at the top of their game combine with striking cinematography and one of the year’s best scores to create something truly extraordinary.

Photo: Lol Crawley / © A24 / Courtesy Everett Collection