Pascal plays Alex Serian, a former child prodigy from a family of Los Angeles studio musicians who returns home after 20 years on tour to record Hollywood film scores. Pascal offers a beautiful, internalized performance that ranks among his best work on film. More than that, it’s the first time a director has built a movie on the merit of what happens across Pascal’s face when nobody is talking.
Pascal did not get his fame from the movies. He was almost 40 when his “Game of Thrones” character Oberyn Martell became one of the most beloved — and most egregiously short-lived — characters In TV history. Then came more series work on “Narcos,” “The Mandalorian” and “The Last of Us.” On that ascent, Pascal became an internet boyfriend (“Daddy,” as many have called him).
You can’t blame me for worrying about audiences focusing on his depth and talent amid the thirst. It is, perhaps, why his scene-stealing performance in the 2022 action-comedy “The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent” went suspiciously ignored. He played Javi, the billionaire superfan of Nicolas Cage (and maybe a cartel kingpin), who went toe-to-toe with one of the most gloriously unhinged actors of his generation.
Pascal stole every frame. Pedro Almodóvar’s short “Strange Way of Life,” Celine Song’s “Materialists” and Ari Aster’s “Eddington” gave Pascal latitude. Gilroy and “Behemoth!” make him undeniable.
Gilroy structures the movie around flashbacks. Each time Pascal’s Alex sits down to play the opening cue of a different movie score, the music sends him back to the people and circumstances that made him flee. Pascal doesn’t overtly articulate those memories.
We feel them in looks, pauses and slight changes in his posture. The performance rises in those moments. Pascal’s work recalls Jude Law in “Cold Mountain,” which is still my go-to example of a reserved performance surviving an Oscar season that typically rewards outsized performances.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
