The Brutalist:
The Unwavering Relevance of Holocaust Cinema
By Olivia Thorne
Adrien Brody (right) and Alessandro Nivola (left) in The Brutalist.
Brady Corbet’s latest and most ambitious feature yet, The Brutalist, starring Adrien Brody and Felicity Jones, has arrived at a crucial time in our political climate.
A24’s historical drama, spanning three and a half hours including a 15-minute interval, follows László Tóth (Brody), a Hungarian-Jewish architect who flees to America following his liberation from a Nazi concentration camp. While he waits for his wife Erzsébet (Jones) and niece Zsófia (Raffey Cassidy) to join him, he finds that the hardships and sufferings he faced in the war are not yet over.
Holocaust Cinema
2023/4 were significant years for films set in and around The Holocaust, most notably with Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest (2023) and James Hawes’ One Life (2024).
Corbet’s feature was released on 24th January 2025, three days before Holocaust Memorial Day, marking eighty years since the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp.
Political tensions are escalating worldwide, from the resurrection of Trump’s America to the ongoing wars in Ukraine and Gaza. In recent years, far-right ideology has gained traction, with neo-Nazi rallies in Germany, anti-immigration riots in the UK, and the twice elected President Trump intensifying controversial immigration raids.
The Brutalist is an impactful study of the displaced. Most films set in and around The Holocaust focus on the atrocities that occurred under Adolf Hitler’s rule, portraying the escalating discrimination of the Jewish people from forced identification to the brutal horrors of concentration camps. Corbet’s film, however, shines light on the lingering, post-war struggles.
Corbet’s Motivations
The film exposes the plight of the asylum seeker. The first ten minutes sees László arrive in America, rejoicing at reaching the ‘land of the free’ after so much persecution. Notably, Corbet inverts the image of The Statue of Liberty as they sail into Manhattan, turning Lady Liberty on her head and suggesting justice may not yet prevail for these displaced people.
Hostility towards immigrants is escalating globally, and the 2024 US election is a stark demonstration of prevailing western ideology. Trump, who branded illegal immigrants as ‘poisoning the blood of our country’ and reducing them to ‘animals’ and ‘rapists’ has so far arrested 956 immigrants less than a month after his inauguration.
Chillingly, Trump’s rhetoric recalls Hitler’s sentiments in Mein Kampf. In his discrimination of the Jewish people, he accuses them of ‘poisoning’ the blood of ‘racially pure people’, strongly aligning them with parasites that need to be exterminated.
The Discrimination of the ‘Other’
After reaching ‘the land of opportunity’ László, a much-revered architect in Europe, is reduced to low-paid, menial labour on a construction site. In hopeless despair, he self-medicates with prostitutes, pornography, alcohol and heroin.
In a particularly poignant moment of the film, László’s wealthy American employer and self-made man Harrison Lee Van Buren (Guy Pearce) stumbles across him in a heroin-induced stupor. Assessing the scene, Van Buren, who is suggested to also be of European descent, quips ‘if you resent persecution, why then do you make of yourself such an easy target?’.
What follows is a barbaric and heinous series of events. Van Buren denounces Tóth as a ‘loafer living off handouts’, a ‘societal leech’ and a ‘prostitute’ before brutally raping him.
This scene, while brief, is a sickeningly visceral metaphor of the abuse and exploitation of asylum seekers. Van Buren demonstrates ownership over Tóth for giving him an opportunity, and that the ‘loafer’ immigrant is beholden to him, and invariably, the United States.
Corbet also highlights the undervaluation of immigrants’ skills and experience. In Doylestown, Tóth employs his expertise to build the town’s first community building. Rather than responding with gratitude, there is an air of distrust, and the suspicious townspeople interrogate him about his religious and political affiliations before agreeing to the build.
Adrien Brody (left) and Guy Pearce (right) in The Brutalist.
Equality in Concrete
The architectural movement of Brutalism emerged in the 1950’s and is often associated with post-war reformation.
Significantly, The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe in Berlin is a striking example of brutalism. Designed by Peter Eisenman, it consists of 2711 concrete steles, which can be passed through from all sides.
The minimalism of the concrete slabs, characteristic of brutalism, echoes Alison and Peter Smithson’s outlook that the movement is ‘an ethic, not an aesthetic’.
Modest structures such as these, identical in their bareness, reflect the inherent equality amongst humans. The raw, unembellished concrete is a powerful reminder that beneath our outward appearances and demeanour, we are all made of the same materials.
László’s affinity with this style is likely connected to his perceived ‘ugliness’, acknowledged by him and others early in the film. This associates him with his buildings when his plans for a concrete community building are branded as ‘ugly’ and that marble would be more beautiful.
Through Tóth’s architecture, Corbet raises the question of aesthetic relativism and provokes the idea of the ‘unwanted presence’.
László’s presence is a grim reminder of war for those who wish to forget it, and have managed to thus far. Like the brutalist buildings erected from the rubble of Europe, he is an embodiment of the destruction inflicted on the world in the years prior. While it may seem easier to bury these harsh realities, it is something that cannot and should not be ignored.
Corbet’s film provides a similar function. While it may not be ‘leisurely’ to watch themes of abuse and discrimination for three and a half hours, it is important – particularly in today’s climate – that we remain informed and reminded of past transgressions to learn from them.
The Statistics
Antisemitism in Europe and the US is growing at an alarming rate.
In 2023, the number of reported anti-semitic incidents in the US had risen from 1,352 in 2008 to 8,873.
The Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe. Credit: Berlin.de
Credit: Statista.com
In the UK, anti-semitic crimes are also at a record high, with 1,978 anti-Jewish hate incidents recorded from January to June 2024, up from 964 in the first half of 2023. Cases of damage and desecration to Jewish property rose by 246% from 24 in the first half of 2023.
A watchdog said that anti-semitism had risen more than 80% in Germany in 2023. It is believed that the large majority of these incidents is due to the war in Gaza, with ¾ of Jewish citizens feeling that people hold them personally responsible for the Israeli government’s actions.
Unfortunately, there are other minority groups that are also feeling the effects of the far-right wave across the globe. In 2024, Greater Manchester police recorded 39 Islamophobic offences a month until August when it jumped to 85.
As the statistics show, the hatred of the ‘other’ and the ‘different’ still casts a sinister shadow.
Parting Sentiments
While The Brutalist focuses specifically on the post-war reality for Jewish Europeans, the persecution and discrimination that László faces is the reality for many immigrants and asylum seekers in 2025, regardless of faith and background.
Corbet ends the film with a speech from niece Zsófia at László’s lifetime achievement gala at which he is in attendance. He is elderly, frail and wheelchair bound.
Zsófia ends her speech, and thus the film, on an adage László told her:
‘Don’t let anyone fool you, Zsófia, no matter what the others try and sell you, it is the destination, not the journey.’
So, what does Corbet mean by this? There are a few possibilities:
It may reference the long suffering that László had to endure, both during the war and afterwards, before he was able to reap the rewards. It could be a warning to Zsófia against becoming complacent on the journey, and to keep moving forwards.
He could also be alluding to the architectural process. To erect a building, rigorous planning and hard work is required. It is not the undertaking that is the triumph, but the finished structure – the destination – that the labour is for.
Or, perhaps, Corbet was anticipating the backlash to the film’s abnormally long run-time. It may be a cheeky nod to audiences that, while they have given their time to his film, they have reached its ‘destination’ and are continuing on their own journeys with greater insight and awareness about the world we live in.