Pedro Pascal’s Oscar movie

It’s mid-summer, which means the countdown to back to school has begun because time is our enemy, but it is most violently the enemy of youth, but it also means we’re counting down to the fall festival season. After the Hollywood studios sat out Cannes, I have no idea if that will extend to the fall festivals, which have a huge role to play in awards season, but assuming the fall fests continue as usual, I fully expect to see Tony Gilroy’s Behemoth! at some combination of Venice, Telluride, and/or TIFF.

The teaser for Behemoth! dropped yesterday, showing off Pedro Pascal as Alex Serian, a cellist on some kind of “you can’t go home again” trip after twenty years away. Outside of upholding franchise obligations to Star Wars and Marvel, Pedro is making interesting choices, working with interesting filmmakers like Ari Aster, Celine Song, and working in large-scale films and smaller, more intimate independent features. A film in which he plays a musician, though, which will involve requisite conversations about “mastering” a new skill for his performance, is sure to be trophy trail catnip.  

The teaser is light on details, as it seems the approach to this film is to layer it in mystery in hopes of building expectations. But expectations exist regardless of marketing, as this is 1) a film starring Pedro Pascal, who is a reigning internet boyfriend, despite the flop that is The Mandalorian and Grogu, and 2) it’s Tony Gilroy’s first project since Andor (though the teaser chooses to highlight Michael Clayton for his directorial bona fides).

The teaser is choosing coyness, and I’m not interested in outguessing a commercial, so I will focus on Pedro Pascal’s convincing physicality as a cellist, it looks as least realistic enough not to be distracting, and the ensemble around him. The film co-stars Olivia Wilde, Eva Victor (the writer/director/star of Sorry, Baby), and Will Arnett. Not included in the teaser are Hank Azaria, Matthew Lillard, and Margarita Levieva.

When I say this teaser is being coy, I mean I cannot tell if Will Arnett is playing Alex Serian’s brother or former lover, but I feel like it could go either way. The teaser also includes a lot of characters yelling and looking mad. So, there is tension and arguments (you can’t go home again). And Alex Serian is seen making out with Eva Victor’s character, who is called “Nadia” and is billed as “Alex’s colleague and love interest”. Sex, fighting, and music? Into it.

I also think it’s funny that the teaser features a chorus singing the title of the film, “Behemoth”, as The Fantastic Four: First Steps did the exact the same thing. The film is Tony Gilroy’s “love letter” to film composition (per Olivia Wilde), and the original music for the film will come from “The Behemoth! Collective”, a group of NINE composers: Michael Abels, Emily Bear, Lukas Frank, Michael Giacchino—who composed that First Steps score, so we know where the title/choral thing comes from—James Newton Howard, Henry Jackman, Nami Melumad, Brandon Roberts, and Alan Silvestri.

Some of the names you might recognize—Michael Giacchnio, James Newton Howard, Henry Jackman, and Alan Silvestri are among the most in-demand composers working in film—and others are relatively newer on the scene, but it’s an interesting mix across styles, generations, and genres (Nami Melumad, for instance, is doing a lot of composing for the expanded Star Trek television universe, where she is the first woman to compose for the TV franchise). I love film music, I listen to a lot of scores while writing, reading, and thinking, so I am very interested to see what this collective produces for a film about the people who make music for film.

Whatever happens with the fall festivals, given the pedigree and the unique music collective at work on the film, Behemoth! should come up in conversations at the end of the year. Can Pedro Pascal bag his first Oscar nomination? Can NINE composers share one nomination? Awards season 2026 is shaping up to be very interesting