{"id":869069,"date":"2026-10-03T05:50:08","date_gmt":"2026-10-03T05:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/869069\/"},"modified":"2026-10-03T05:50:08","modified_gmt":"2026-10-03T05:50:08","slug":"behemoth-review-pedro-pascal-in-tony-gilroys-wan-character-study","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/869069\/","title":{"rendered":"‘Behemoth!’ Review: Pedro Pascal in Tony Gilroy’s Wan Character Study"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tTony Gilroy<\/a> returns to features after 14 years\u2019 absence \u2014 the last three of them spent in the Star Wars TV trenches as creator, showrunner and head writer on Andor<\/a> \u2014 with a movie that makes itself hard to love. Hampered by a fussy hopscotching time structure that too often halts the dramatic momentum and by a central character whose passivity fights against the warmth and magnetism of Pedro Pascal<\/a> in the role, Behemoth! is an odd duck, alternately intriguing and frustrating. What it does have going for it is a series of thrilling sequences observing the workings of an orchestra employed on Hollywood\u2019s scoring stages.<\/p>\n

\n\tThat rarely glimpsed milieu and a virtuoso cellist protagonist might make Gilroy\u2019s film sound like Maestro<\/a> meets T\u00e1r<\/a>. But the story\u2019s internal engine seldom revs hard enough to stand up to either of those comparisons, despite its capable ensemble cast and polished craftsmanship.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tBehemoth!\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\t\t\t\t\tThe Bottom Line<\/p>\n

\tAdagio when it needs to be agitato.<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\tVenue: New York Film Festival (Centerpiece \u2014 Main Slate)
Release date: Friday, Dec. 4
Cast: Pedro Pascal, Olivia Wilde, Eva Victor, Alexa Swinton, Kaya Ralls, Erik Griffin, JoBeth Williams, Margarita Levieva, Hank Azaria, Will Arnett
Director-screenwriter: Tony Gilroy
\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t2 hours 7 minutes\n\t\t<\/p>\n

\n\tOne issue is that the script by Gilroy (an Oscar nominee for screenwriting and direction on Michael Clayton) gives insufficient dimension to Pascal\u2019s character, Alex Serian, for someone meant to carry a film. He\u2019s a sideliner in his own life, which may well be the result of living in the shadow of a family of narcissists, but that is not enough to make him interesting. Nor does it help that Alex\u2019s failed relationships seem less a symptom of his own damage than his poor choice of partners.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe women characters generally are not drawn kindly, especially Carol Spedding (Olivia Wilde<\/a>), a wealthy, married arts patron whose ferocious pursuit of Alex when he ends their affair makes her seem like a soul sister to Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. Maybe Carol\u2019s $6 million gift to the Chicago Symphony during Alex\u2019s tenure there enables her to feel some kind of ownership, though that\u2019s more implied than explored. \u201cI bleed for you and you shun me?\u201d screeches the manic drama queen after he blocks her calls.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlex\u2019s flight from scary Carol lands him back in his hometown, Los Angeles, after 20 years of playing in other cities, looking to get back into session work recording orchestral film scores. It\u2019s in those scenes on studio lots \u2014 including the Barbra Streisand Scoring Studio at Sony \u2014 that the movie is most dynamic. <\/p>\n

\n\tThat\u2019s in large part due to the staggering range of ravishing original film music we see being performed \u2014 from dark drama to suspense to action to soaring romance \u2014 written by an assembly of nine respected composers billed as \u201cThe Behemoth!<\/a> Collective.\u201d They include Michael Abels, Emily Bear, Lukas Frank, Michael Giacchino, James Newton Howard, Henry Jackman, Nami Melumad, Brandan Roberts and Alan Silvestri. Much of their work also plays over scenes elsewhere in the movie, including an art rock song, a requiem, a cartoon theme tune, a harp concerto and cello etudes.<\/p>\n

\n\tFor anyone who loves movies, being prompted to think about the experiential role that a great score plays is fascinating, but while Behemoth! feints toward being a celebration of film music, it never fully commits. It seems a missed opportunity that we don\u2019t get to watch music being matched to specific beats on the screen, beyond background shots of fuzzy footage on a monitor.<\/p>\n

\n\tAlex\u2019s relationship with his parents was defined by their need to outshine their children. We see video of Alex playing Bach at age 6 on Johnny Carson\u2019s show, but the film seems to suggest their nurturing of their sons\u2019 musical gifts was just another way to burnish their own reputations.<\/p>\n

\n\tHis self-absorbed brother Andy (Will Arnett<\/a>, who\u2019s in a different movie) became something of a black sheep when he turned his back on classical viola to form a briefly successful rock band in the \u201890s. He now hosts a podcast about the TV and movie themes of their late father Peter (Hank Azaria<\/a>, in a video cameo). Their mother Ginnie (an unrecognizable JoBeth Williams<\/a>) was a renowned harpist, fading fast with dementia when Alex stays with her upon first returning to L.A. She once said of her husband, \u201cHe was a Peter who really wanted to be a Pierre.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tBut those glimmers of insight fail to coalesce into a fleshed-out family mythology \u2014 though we do learn that Alex and Andy\u2019s grandfather died from a stroke, immedicately after hitting a high C while playing trumpet on the same MGM stage where Alex now works. There\u2019s simply not enough meat on the bones of the parental background or in Alex and Andy\u2019s conversations about them to give much shape to the supposedly chaotic upbringing that formed them.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe movie is more engaged in Alex\u2019s reflections on his own life in the two decades since he left, jumping between fizzled relationships and elite orchestra positions in Boston, Dallas and Chicago. The one woman he appears to have loved is brilliant violinist Nadia (Eva Victor<\/a>), who bailed to marry a billionaire businessman (Matthew Lillard). Victor (Sorry, Baby<\/a>) is a vivid screen presence, but Nadia isn\u2019t around long enough to leave much of an impression before Alex\u2019s memories jump to her funeral six years later.<\/p>\n

\n\tIt\u2019s on that solemn occasion that he first sees Nadia\u2019s prodigiously gifted daughter Viviana when she plays an original piano composition of astonishing maturity. That piques Alex\u2019s curiosity about the possibility that he might be the girl\u2019s father; his paternity sleuthing gives the movie a much-needed kick.<\/p>\n

\n\tWhile Alex\u2019s romantic past is too thinly outlined to be compelling, Pascal\u2019s internalized performance becomes more affecting once the character\u2019s paternal instincts emerge. This happens first with Bronte (Kaya Ralls), a bright young cellist he coaches for an audition with the prestigious San Francisco Symphony. (Professional musician Ralls is a natural in her first acting role.)<\/p>\n

\n\tBut it\u2019s when he starts following Viviana\u2019s success as a composer and musician across multiple genres that the film finally gains some emotional heft. An interlude during which their professional paths cross, when 15-year-old Viviana (Alexa Swinton, terrific) is hired to take over scoring duties on a major movie from a temperamental Euro-diva (Thomas Kretschmann, amusingly playing a male Lydia T\u00e1r), is lovely. But it comes too late in a movie that gives us few reasons to care about its opaque central character.<\/p>\n

\n\tBehemoth! is handsomely shot by Dami\u00e1n Garc\u00eda, who previously worked with Gilroy on Andor, but in the end it\u2019s satisfying only as a sensory experience in which music acquires physical form, an aspect greatly enhanced by the advanced sound technology of Dolby Atmos.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tony Gilroy returns to features after 14 years\u2019 absence \u2014 the last three of them spent in the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":869070,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[128289,88,128290,302978,366433,45374,366434,139162,5432,57178,73017],"class_list":["post-869069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-behemoth","tag-entertainment","tag-eva-victor","tag-hank-azaria","tag-jobeth-williams","tag-new-york-film-festival","tag-new-york-film-festival-2026","tag-olivia-wilde","tag-pedro-pascal","tag-tony-gilroy","tag-will-arnett"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=869069"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/869069\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/869070"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=869069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=869069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=869069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}