Writer/Director Sean Baker is a much admired Independent filmmaker who frequently points his camera at sex workers in order to humanize them. In his latest film, ANORA - the Palm D’Or winner at Cannes last year - Baker once agains uses a documentary style, guerilla filmmaking to capture a Cinderella story of a sex worker who just might find a happy ending with the son of a Russian drug/arms dealer.
And…this movie might have been interesting had it not seemed so much like an episode of THE SOPRANOS.
Mikey Madison (in a Best Actress Nominated Performance) stars as Anora “Ani” Mikheeva, an exotic dancer/escort who is fierce, uncompromising and wounded. It’s a strong performance and is a worthy Oscar nominee.
Because Anora grew up in a Russian neighborhood in Brooklyn, she can speak some Russian, so she is asked to perform for Ivan “Vanya” Zakharov (Mark Eydelshteyn), the spoiled son of a Russian oligarch. A whirlwind romance ensues ending up with a “quickie” Las Vegas marriage - a marriage that does not go over well with Vanya’s family.
If you are familiar with Baker (who is nominated for Directing, Screenwriting and Editing) for previous works like TANGERINE or the Oscar Nominated THE FLORIDA PROJECT, then you will be happy to see that he continues to deliver a gritty, documentary-style film that looks like his cameras just happened to catch these two lovebirds in the throes of their courtship. Good for him for this triple nomination (and for this film’s Best Picture nomination) it is well earned by Baker.
However, the film suffers from an over-long focus on the courtship/romance. One pretty much knows where this is going, but the 1st 1/3 (at least) of this film goes on for quite a long time (too long, if you were to ask me).
The action picks up in the 2nd half of the film as a couple of goons sent by Vanya’s parents try to get the marriage annulled. It is this part of the film that is the most interesting - but it did seem like an Episode of THE SOPRANOS (just insert Paulie Walnuts and Christopher for the Russian goons and you’ve got the picture). Yura Borisov (one of the goons) is nominated for Best Supporting Actor…and good for him. HOWEVER, I had to look up him up after the film to see which one he was - the trio of goons is pretty much interchangeable, and see no Oscar-worthy performance amongst them.
Finally, the film falls apart in the 3rd act. It was like Baker lost interest in the subject matter/material and he just wanted to end it…which he does (fairly abruptly).
Good for the Academy for recognizing this small, independent film.
I’ll just watch the Sopranos.
Letter Grade: B
7 stars (out of 10) and you can take that to the Bank (ofMarquis)
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