Brutalist architecture derives much of its power from reconciling two seemingly contradictory extremes. The simple structuralism of its design and materials lead many to characterize the style as minimalistic. However, the scope of the buildings made in the style often has a maximalist impact on those taking them in.

A similar paradox lies at the heart of Brady Corbet’s The Brutalist, a decade-spanning saga tracing the travails of Adrien Brody’s László Toth, a Hungarian immigrant attempting to achieve his most ambitious architectural project in post-World War II America. This is a towering epic that takes a country’s national character as its very subject without ever losing its footing in the intimacies of a character study. While a cinematic undertaking of such colossal proportions requires the orchestration of many below-the-line collaborators, one stands out in harmonizing the various inputs: composer Daniel Blumberg.

Before any images appear on screen in The Brutalist,...