I don’t have any hard stats to back this up, but it feels like long movies are having a moment. Maybe it’s the rise in binge-watching, or, conversely, a cultural reaction against the short-attention-span-theater we all seem to be living in, but mainstream audiences have been more amenable to butt-numbers such as Oppenheimer and Killers of the Flower Moon than one might expect. The biggest test yet for this newfound endurance will come with the widening release of director Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist, which took home the Best Motion Picture—Drama award at Sunday’s Golden Globes, making it the frontrunner at the moment for the top prize at the Oscars. It’s also a 215-minute, intellectually challenging, utterly serious epic biography that spans decades in the life of a Jewish architect and Holocaust survivor. Not exactly popcorn material, but then again neither was Oppenheimer on paper.

Adrien Brody, who won the Golden Globe for Best Actor (and won an Oscar more than twenty years ago for playing another Holocaust survivor in The Pianist), inhabits the role of László Tóth, who arrives in New York City just after World War II to stay with his cousin Attila (Alessandro Nivola) and Attila’s wife (Emma Laird). Tóth’s own wife remains in Europe, and his immediate goal is to raise the money that would enable her to join him in forging a new life. An acclaimed architect in his former life, he starts out in America working in that cousin’s furniture store, but gets a break when the son (Joe Alwyn) of blustery tycoon Harrison Van Buren (Guy Pearce) hires the firm to remake the old man’s library while he’s out of town. The old man is furious at the result, but eventually convinces (coerces?) Tóth to design a community center in Pennsylvania which is designed to honor Van Buren’s late mother. In return, he arranges for László’s wife, Erzsébet (Felicity Jones), and niece (Raffey Cassidy) to make the belated journey to the ostensible land of the free.

Plotwise, there’s not much more than that. But actor-turned-director Brady Corbet’s first two films (The Childhood of a Leader and Vox Lux), while notable, gave little hint of the grand ambition he displays here. Corbet shot The Brutalist using 70mm cameras and the VistaVision process, which hadn’t been employed for a feature film since Marlon Brando’s One-Eyed Jacks in 1961. The script, by Corbet and frequent collaborator Mona Fastvold, succeeds in telling a profoundly human story and in incorporating an almost overwhelming array of themes, including the effect of capitalism on art, the post-World War II immigrant experience, the trauma of survivors, and the paradoxes of the “American Dream.” It’s been (reductively) said that American films are about character and European films are about ideas, but The Brutalist straddles and encompasses that divide.

Making a commercial film of this length is in itself an audacious act, especially coming from a filmmaker who has not (yet) accumulated the auteurist capital of a Nolan or a Scorsese. Fortunately—nay, brilliantly—the film includes an intermission, one which comes perfectly placed between the narrative’s two acts, and which—again, brilliantly—includes a countdown clock so audience members know exactly how much time remains before the entertainment resumes. Still, there are many who will be intimidated by the duration, even though it’s only a shade shorter than the entire running time of Baby Reindeer (or a typical awards show). Me, I’m gearing up for a second viewing. (Opens on Friday, Jan. 10, at the Hollywood Theater [in 70mm] and Cinema 21)

ALSO OPENING

The Room Next Door: For his first English-language feature in a fifty-year career, iconic Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar, whose oeuvre is stuffed with meaty, memorable female roles, clearly had his pick of actors. He chose wisely: Julianne Moore and Tilda Swinton would seem to be perfect choices for Almodóvar’s heightened aesthetic. So how to explain, then, that the result is, while eminently watchable, sort of underwhelming when you take its pedigree into account?

Moore plays Ingrid, a best-selling author who receives word that an old acquaintance, who she hasn’t seen in years, is terminally ill with cancer. Martha (Swinton) is a former war correspondent who has decided to end her life on her terms, but wants someone to be near when she euthanizes herself, to be, as she puts it, in “the room next door.” The pair travel to the country to stay in a rental home for a last weekend, having bonded anew in this more difficult time. They share a former paramour (John Turturro) who pops in, a man who has soured into a doomsayer and a foil for the women’s braver, richer approach to mortality.

In Almodóvarian fashion, everything is visually stunning in this movie: the people, the clothes, the houses, the landscapes. A cynic might carp that all the turmoil and anxiety felt by Ingrid and Martha is nothing compared to that felt by, say, similarly situated women without the material resources to arrange for such a perfectly poetic passing. But melodrama is a genre of the affluent, and so it is here. If anything, The Room Next Door is relatively staid compared to the flourishing emotionalism and narrative contrivance of a typical Almodóvar effort.

It’s possible that Almodóvar’s vibrant color palette, preternaturally composed and attractive characters, and larger-than-life plots simply go down easier when filtered through subtitles. The heightened reality that pops and entices in a Spanish milieu doesn’t have the same impact in an American setting, especially when the subject matter is this melancholic. Of course, any collaboration between this filmmaker and these lead actors is worthwhile, but The Room Next Door feels destined to be a curiosity rather than a landmark in the careers of each. (Opens Friday, Jan. 10, at Cinema 21)

The Last Showgirl: A lament for Lost Vegas and a showcase for a memorable performance from Pamela Anderson, this small-scale character study fits comfortably in the shadow cast by The Substance. That rollicking, rageful feminist fable allowed Demi Moore a chance to clap back at her career-long objectification, while here Anderson plays Shelly, the most venerable cast member in “Les Razzle Dazzle,” an old-school casino floor show on its last legs. The star, who rocketed to fame in the 1980s as a Playboy centerfold and the iconic, jiggle-jogging star of Baywatch, can relate to aging out of an industry that consumes young female flesh. Her performance here is vulnerable and commendable, but to correctly label it a career-best is only to say that it rises above the level of Barb Wire.

Anderson’s not helped by Kate Gerston’s generally trite script, which relies on stock characters that include the veteran (Brenda Song) and the ingénue (Kiernan Shipka) who share a dressing room with Shelly, the estranged daughter (Billie Lorde) she reaches out to, and the kindly stage manager (Dave Bautista, in a nice change of pace) who might be her best shot at romance. The liveliest contribution comes from Jamie Lee Curtis, who plays a former “Razzle Dazzle” cast member who has moved on to a second career as a cocktail waitress. It’s a little weird seeing Shipka, little Sally Draper from Mad Men, done up in a jeweled bustier and false eyelashes.

Director Gia Coppola, Francis Ford’s granddaughter, made a strong feature debut with 2013’s Palo Alto, a film that now has increased ick factor thanks to the casting of James Franco as a high school soccer coach who has a relationship with one of his players (Emma Roberts). Here, she and cinematographer Autumn Durald Arkapaw utilize a grainy, blown-out color scheme and smudge the edges of the frame to give The Last Showgirl a bleary, off-kilter mundanity. Visually and narratively, the focus remains squarely on Shelly’s small corner of the world (i.e. Las Vegas), to the degree that we never see the crowd at “Les Razzle Dazzle” and we never get any real backstory on anyone, with a single exception that’s unfortunately all too predictable.

As a portrait of a vanishing subculture, and the people left behind, The Last Showgirl works well enough. But it’s neither original nor well-crafted enough to stand out from the crowd. (Opens Friday, Jan. 10, at Living Room Theaters, Regal Fox Tower, and other locations)

Den of Thieves 2: Pantera: “Big Nick is back on the hunt in Europe and closing in on Donnie, who is embroiled in the treacherous world of diamond thieves and the infamous Panther mafia, as they plot a massive heist of the world’s largest diamond exchange.” Stars Gerard Butler and O’Shea Jackson Jr. (Opens Friday, Jan. 10; wide release)

Game Changer: “An honest IAS officer’s fight against a corrupt political system through fair and transparent elections.” Telugu-language production. (Opens Friday, Jan. 10, at Century Eastport, Clackamas Town Center, Cedar Hills, Bridgeport Village, Movies on TV)

Peter Pan’s Neverland Nightmare: “Wendy Darling strikes out in an attempt to rescue her brother Michael from ‘the clutches of the evil Peter Pan.’ Along the way she meets Tinkerbell, who will be seen taking heroin, believing that it’s pixie dust.” In the tradition of Blood & Honey. (Screens Monday through Wednesday at Regal Fox Tower and other locations)

ALSO THIS WEEK

Boom! A Film About the Sonics: The Sonics are an iconic Northwest band, acknowledged by those in the know as quite possibly the first punk rock group and a huge influence on the grunge rock scene that would turn the region into a cultural touchstone in the 1990s. But it wasn’t always thus, as this entertaining and revelatory documentary by Jordan Albertsen makes clear. Formed in 1960 in Tacoma, The Sonics released their first LP in 1965 and a second the following year, their raw sound indelibly preserved on tunes such as “The Witch,” “Psycho,” and “Strychnine.” While the fervid screams of vocalist Jerry Roslie and the thunderous thwacks of drummer Bobby Bennett still feel dangerous today, it’s hard to imagine their impact at a time when, as one interviewee notes, The Beatles where still in their “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” era. Albertsen grafts a personal story about how he and his father bonded over a shared love of The Sonics, but the real treat is hearing all five original members (plus manager Buck Ormsby) tell their stories. After a third, unsuccessful record, the band disbanded and its members went on to mundane careers, only to learn decades later that their music had become a touchstone, especially in Europe, for the resurgence in what became known as garage rock. This leads, as all good music documentaries should, to a reunion concert and belated recognition from luminaries, here including Mudhoney’s Mark Arm and Soundgarden’s Kim Thayil. The film played festivals back in 2018, but never received a proper release, perhaps because of music rights issues. Regardless, it’s now getting the exposure it deserves. There will be a Q&A with Albertsen following the screening. (Screens on Friday, Jan. 10, at the Clinton Street Theater)

Shattered Dreams: Sex Trafficking in America: This documentary examines the pervasive, dark underworld of sex trafficking in America. Heart-wrenching personal stories from survivors of the illicit sex trade and leading experts reveal how vastly misunderstood and disregarded this important human rights issue has been. As hundreds of thousands of victims’ lives are destroyed by this multi-billion-dollar industry, the complex challenge of targeting the cause of this deeply embedded problem is exposed. Will increased awareness finally drive real solutions to save lives or will we continue to let this underground industry thrive in America?” (Screens on Saturday, Jan. 11, at the Tomorrow Theater; followed by a presentation by local nonprofit A Village for One and a panel discussion)

The Columbia River Canoe Project: “A new documentary follows Robert Lester and Braxton Mitchel as they canoe 1,300 miles from the continental divide to the Pacific Ocean in an effort to bring attention to the health of the river basin and how dramatically it has changed.” (Screens on Monday, Jan. 13, at the Clinton St. Theater)

Celluloid Jukebox: “Join archivists Ioana and Garrett on a jukebox joyride through the decades, spanning Jazz, Blues, Folk, cartoons, sing-alongs and wild psychedelia. Featuring films from the legendary archive of the late Dennis Nyback, this is a show you won’t see anywhere else. Here is a chance to go somewhere beyond YouTube, MTV, or even the Ed Sullivan show, to something truly underground.” (Screens on Tuesday, Jan. 14, on 16mm, at the Clinton St. Theater)

STREAMING PICKS

It’s Not Me: French auteur Leos Carax pays tribute to Jean-Luc Godard with this forty-minute montage in the mold of Godard’s later, more abstract work. He incorporates images from his own films and those of others into a pseudo-autobiographical rumination and a Godardian concern about the end of cinema. (Over a scene from Murnau’s Sunrise, Carax notes that when grips had to push a massive camera on a dolly to capture a shot, it seemed that a god was watching the characters on screen. When a boyfriend films his girlfriend with an iPhone, that’s missing. How can we regain “the gaze of the Gods,” he wonders.) Musical cues range from Daniel Johnston to David Bowie, and you’d literally have to be Leos Carax to get every visual and aural reference. In that way, it accomplishes what it sets out to do, in that it’s nearly as structurally fascinating and frustratingly abstruse as Godard’s final works. But Carax knows enough not to wear out his welcome, and so it never achieves quite the exhausted epiphanies of Goodbye to Language or The Image Book. Of his own work, Carax favors what’s generally considered his masterpiece, 2012’s Holy Motors, and his 1991 The Girl on the Bridge, but fans of Annette, his 2021 collaboration with Sparks that starred Adam Driver and Marion Cotillard as the parents of a marionette, needn’t fear: the titular puppet does show up in a post-credit sequence that provides a random, cheeky postscript. (Streaming on the Criterion Channel)

Pepe and Cocote: This much is true: Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar imported hippopotamuses from Africa for his private zoo. After he died in 1993, four of them were left to roam his estate, and within a couple decades, there were dozens of hippos contentedly wallowing in the waters of nearby Colombian jungles. In 2009, after dangerous encounters with humans, one of them, named Pepe, was killed by hunters hired by local authorities. Dominican director Nelson Carlo de los Santos has taken this already surreal story and used it as the backbone for a discursive meditation on, I guess, the nature of consciousness and the unknowability of nature. Or something. The film is, at times, narrated from beyond the grave by Pepe himself. At other times, de los Santos presents stunning drone cinematography of these bloated pachyderms lazing away in their blessed ignorance. The closest thing to a narrative throughline comes as a local fisherman has a close encounter with Pepe, but finds that neither his wife nor the village inspector will take him seriously. The whole enterprise is more abstract than it really needs to be, but remains compelling in its weirdness. De los Santos’s previous feature, 2017’s Cocote, also has its streaming premiere, and uses a similar vibe to tell a more straightforward story. In it, a gardener working for a wealthy family returns to the village he was raised in after his father is murdered by a corrupt police officer over an unpaid debt. Under pressure to return to his job, he’s nevertheless drawn into an extended mourning ritual that chafes against his evangelical Christianity. An examination of the divisions (urban/rural, tradition/modernity) in Dominican society, it—like Pepe—combines fiction and documentary in a way that grounds the former and gives the latter the power of myth. (Streaming on MUBI)

Look Into My Eyes: I think this was the only 2024 release from prestige distributor A24 that did not have a theatrical run in Oregon. It’s a documentary about six professional psychics in New York City, and the most remarkable thing about it is its refusal to mock either these practitioners or their earnest, vulnerable clients.

A couple of traits seem more prevalent among this set than they are among the general population. One is a personal history with significant loss or trauma. One woman, who specializes in contacting lost or dead animals, was raised by a severely dysfunctional single father. Another mourns the younger brother who died as a child. Unsurprisingly, these folks also tend to have a history and/or an aspiration in the performing arts. Assuming for the sake of argument that they are not genuinely channeling spirits from the beyond, the job requires a high level of improvisation and an ability to connect with an audience. They’ve got esoteric taste in films, too: one is a John Waters superfan with a poster for Werner Herzog’s Even Dwarves Started Small on her wall, while Walter Salles’s Central Station and the Canadian indie necrophilia drama Kissed each get shout-outs.

Director Lara Wilson chooses to forgo any musical score or other embellishments during the scenes capturing actual sessions, letting the words, and especially faces, of the participants do the work. One highly charged encounter emerges when a client turns out randomly to be a high school classmate of the psychic she’s hired to contact a mutual acquaintance who committed suicide as a teen. That episode, and others, outline what might be the film’s thesis: it doesn’t matter if these psychics have supernatural powers, or whether they even think they do. They provide a therapeutic service, one that may be based more on intuitive human connection than cognitive science but that nevertheless helps a few people make it through one more day. And it’s hard to begrudge them that. (Streaming on Max)

REPERTORY

Friday

• Jawbreaker [1999] (Tomorrow Theater)
• Tales from the Crypt: Demon Knight [1995] (Cinemagic)
• This Is the End [2013] (5th Avenue Cinemas, on 35mm, through Jan. 12)
• Top Hat [1935] (Kiggins Theatre)

Saturday

• 13 Assassins [2010] (Cinemagic, also Jan. 14 & 16)
• Moonage Daydream [2022] (Clinton St. Theater)
• Oldboy [2003] (Cinemagic, through Jan. 13, also Jan. 16)
• Paprika [2006] (Cinemagic, through Jan. 14)
• Rear Window [1954] (Cinema 21)

Sunday

• Let’s Get Lost [1988] (Hollywood Theatre, also Jan. 17 & 18)
• Tampopo [1985] (Tomorrow Theater)
• The Taste of Things [2023] (Tomorrow Theater)

Monday

• Gilda [1946] (Kiggins Theatre)
• The Net [1995] (Hollywood Theatre)

Wednesday

• Made in Hong Kong [1997] (Cinemagic)

Thursday

• Downstairs [1932] (Hollywood Theatre)
• The Fall [2006] (Clinton St. Theater)