‘The Brutalist' Budget Was “Under $10M"

The most acclaimed film of this year’s fall fests is without a doubt Brady Corbet’s “The Brutalist.” A lot of the discussion seems to revolve around the film’s runtime and intermission, and the general consensus was that making this film probably didn’t come cheap.

Yet, Corbet is telling THR that “The Brutalist” was made for “under $10M” which is staggeringly low for such an ambitious work of art. I’m absolutely amazed by that low number. Given how big the film feels, and the way it was filmed, this is an absolute triumph.

The general belief is that indie movies need to scale it back given all of the budgetary restraints, but “The Brutalist” seems to have defied all of that. It has a monumental scale to it, an event-worthy craftsmanship that make it a very lived-in film, one which spans over five decades of one man’s life.

Now I get why Corbet has said, multiple times, that “The Brutalist” is “a lot of things that everyone tells you you’re not allowed to do” in filmmaking. It quite literally throws out the conventions of indie filmmaking 101 and defies what low-budget projects can achieve.

The end result is that “The Brutalist” won the Silver Lion at Venice and is now a major Oscar contender. A24 recently bought it for $10M. It’s set to screen at numerous other festivals this fall and will be released in theaters sometime in November/December.

Corbet’s 3-hour 35-minute historical epic tackles a Jewish immigrant’s rise as a brilliant architect in post-WWII America. Adrien Brody’s performance is towering, and Guy Pearce is brilliant as the shady millionaire who hires him to build an ambitious project.

Corbet's immigrant saga is so meticulously constructed that, despite a few narrative lapses, you can’t help but be astonished by the sheer audacity of it all. I was rarely bored. The film is stunningly shot by cinematographer Lol Crawley in VistaVision no less, and some of the shots concocted, the audacious movements of the camera and editing, will make your jaw drop.