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‘The Brutalist’ is the first big winner of the 2025 Oscar season

The Brutalist is an epic about a man building a massive building in the aftermath of World War II

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Adrien Brody in The Brutalist
A24

The 2025 Oscar season is starting to take shape, filled with movies that are all hoping to become awards season favorites. The Brutalist, Brady Corbett’s historical epic, just got a big boost in that regard when it was awarded best film at the New York Film Critics’ Circle Awards.

The movie also won for best actor for Adrien Brody’s lead performance, suggesting that it was one of the strongest movies of the year with the critics group. The NYFCC is the oldest critics group in America, and while their tastes can sometimes be more high-brow than the Academy, the group has been a reliable bellwether for the Oscars for years. Since the Academy expanded its list of Best Picture nominees, there have only been two instances where the NYFCC winner didn’t secure a nomination (Carol in 2015 and First Cow in 2020).

The Brutalist | Official Trailer HD | A24

Elsewhere, the NYFCC awarded Ramell Ross best director for his work on Nickel Boys, and Marianne Jean-Baptiste with best actress for her performance in Mike Leigh’s Hard Truths.

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The Brutalist‘s success with this critics group offers the film some momentum headed into one crucial stretch of awards season, but the movie’s long runtime and slightly inaccessible plot have some wondering if it might be too high-brow for some in the Academy. The film tells the story of a man escaping from Eastern Europe after World War II who settles in Pennsylvania and eventually begins work on a massive building. The movie has been seen as a potential awards season favorite for one time, and this victory further cements that status.

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Joe Allen
Joe Allen
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Joe Allen is a freelance culture writer based in upstate New York. His work has been published in The Washington Post, The…
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