Behemoth! LFF review: Pedro Pascal leads meandering but compelling drama
Pedro Pascal has been booked and busy for years and trusted with leading TV shows like The Last of Us and The Mandalorian. With Behemoth!, he has finally been given the opportunity to carry a movie by himself. It’s about time!
In this drama, written and directed by Michael Clayton’s Tony Gilroy, Pascal plays cellist Alex Serian, who returns to Los Angeles to be a session musician for composers recording film scores. Through flashbacks, we learn more about Alex’s troubled life, including why he left an orchestra in Chicago and his pivotal run at an orchestra in Dallas.
The story constantly jumps back and forth in time and place, and it’s hard to keep track of where it fits in the chronology of his life. It’s quite slow and fragmented, but the puzzle pieces gradually come together and it becomes clear, and there are some cool reveals along the way.
Given that Gilroy is known for writing complicated stories like Michael Clayton, Andor and the Bourne franchise, Behemoth! feels like a minor work, because there’s not a plot as such. It’s a character study about a very complex person and his messy baggage. The dialogue and dynamics are interesting, but it’s not to the same high standard as typical Gilroy scripts. This is best exemplified by Olivia Wilde‘s character, a jilted lover who is stalking Alex. She’s initially exciting as this confrontational, feisty person, but then she’s not given anything else to do.
Pascal is excellent as the tortured soul carrying a lot of unaddressed trauma. This manifests itself in his messy personal life and approach to relationships. He looks professional and put together on the outside, but his private life is in shambles, and he’s constantly running away from his problems. Pascal certainly had a cello double for some shots, but there are a lot of moments where he’s doing it for real with nowhere to hide. I’m sure cellists will have a lot to say about his technique, but from my standpoint, he was just inconsistent. Sometimes I believed it, sometimes I didn’t.
I loved the setting of the film though. It is a love letter to scoring film and the session musicians who bring the composer’s vision to life. I had no idea how these sessions worked so I found those scenes absolutely fascinating. As you might expect, the score the musicians create is fantastic, as is the score for the film itself. Gilroy worked with nine different composers, including Michael Giacchino, James Newton Howard and Alan Silvestri, and there is a cool audio moment during the credits, so make sure you stay for that.
Behemoth! is a compelling character portrait with a tormented performance from Pascal. The meandering structure is its biggest downfall, and it’s a shame the script isn’t up to Gilroy’s usual standard.
Showing at the London Film Festival. In cinemas on 4th December