Cannes’ Palme d’Or winner ANORA follows a Brooklyn exotic dancer who marries the son of a Russian oligarch and the wild series of events after the oligarch finds out and sets out to annul the marriage. Director Sean Baker wowed audiences with his breakout FLORIDA PROJECT, which told the story of little girl living in a Florida motel converted to cheap weekly rental apartments, but Baker’s other films, often sly comedies set in a world of sex workers and people at the lowest economic rung, are not for everyone. Although there is some of that in ANORA, this one is also a deeply human film about dreams and human connections that takes unexpected turns as it shifts from comedic to touchingly human drama.
Mikey Madison stars are Anora, a Russian American who goes by Ani and works as an exotic dancer at a upscale gentleman’s club in New York. Ani is a fun-loving young woman who parties with her friends from work but lives with her older sister in a tiny house situated under the elevated subway tracks. Ani speaks some Russian, because her beloved Russian grandmother never learned English, so her boss goes to her when a client asks for someone who speaks the language, pulling her off her meal break.
Grumbling, Ani nonetheless go to the table to entertain the young son of a Russian oligarch. Ivan Zakharov (Mark Eydelshteyn) speaks some English but is more comfortable with Russian, which Ani understands better than she speaks. The two seems to hit it off, partly because of the common language difficulties. Ivan tells her he is 21 but he looks, and acts, much younger. He also tells her his father is a billionaire arms dealer, a scary person, and he’s avoiding him in America. Very taken with Ani, he asks if he can see her outside work, and she agrees.
“Outside work” means sex for money, of course. Ani is very business-like about it but the young Russian heaps her with compliments and is more than willing to pay whatever she asks. The two actually have fun together, besides plenty of sex,, and Ivan asks Ani to be his “girlfriend” for a week, paid of course. They go to parties, hang out with his friends where she seems accepted as Ivan’s girlfriend.
On a trip to Las Vegas, he starts talking about getting married so he can stay in America. When he proposes to her, Ani scolds him, telling him not to kid about that kind of thing. He insists he means it, and they skip off to a little Vegas wedding chapel.
Both Ivan and Ani are euphoric after the wedding, and the film takes on a romantic tone as they seem very much a couple in love. Her new husband heaps praise, and furs and jewelry, on her, and the formerly cynical Ani changes her view of the world as she settles into life in Ivan’s mansion. She even talks of looking forward to meeting his parents, and imaging becoming part of the family they way she has already become part of his circle of friends.
But then the parents find out about the marriage, and they are outraged. The oligarch sends his American representative, an Armenian named Toros (Karren Karagulian), who is supposed to be keeping an eye on his son, to get the marriage annulled and straighten things out. To do that, Toros shows up at Ivan’s mansion (which really belongs to his parents), along with two more guys as muscle, his regular Armenian henchman Garnick (Armenian actor and comedian Vache Tovmaysan) and a new guy, a Russian named Igor (Yura Borisov, who was so excellent in the Finnish romantic drama COMPARTMENT NO. 6), just hired for this job. The trio all expect this to be an easy job but Ani quickly changes that, proving to be a fierce fighter, both objecting to suggestions they are not really married, to efforts to annul the marriage, and even insisting she meet her husband’s parents, her new in-laws. Everything descends into chaos and comedy as this little woman fights back furiously when the two guys brought along as muscle try to manhandle her, impressing particularly the Russian, Igor, a guy who is not looking to join the Armenians crime underworld, and later reveals a fondness for his immigrant grandma.
Stylishly shot and with a compelling pace, ANORA transforms again and again. A trio of thugs show up determined to carry out Ivan’s parents’ demand to break up the couple with an annulment but set off a shift to action and comedy, with a wild chase and plenty of plot twists, when the son goes on the run and the thugs hang onto Ani to find him. A film that starts out like a Cinderella story, morphs into a comic crime chase, but later into a human drama as people and circumstances continue to change.
As Ani proves a resourceful fighter and the thugs search for the runaway Russian son, the film leans into comedy but the characters are also evolving as those action scenes entertain us. Nothing is as straightforward as they, or the audience, thought. Ani in particular goes through self-reflection and changes, as her view of her world shifts again and dreams seem to evaporate. The changes are touching, sometimes heartbreaking, transforming the film into something different than we expected.
The final scene, beautifully acted by Mikey Madison and Borisov, is particularly powerful, and unexpected moment of searing human feeling, a scene that will stay with you and creates a final shift of the film, as Ani becomes Anora, who lingers in our mind.
Both the acting and the writing are strong in this surprising film, as director Sean Baker firmly steers the film, and the audience, though all its character and tonal shifts. The film’s early more comic sections are highly entertaining but it is the character transformation that stay with us, particularly as Ani, then Anora, goes though that moving ending scene that elevates the film into a new level of human feeling.
Sean Baker’s skill as a director is undeniable in all his films but turning that talent to this story about a young woman being transformed by experiences to reach a truer self is breathtaking. It is no mystery why this tale was a big winner at Cannes, or that ANORA has gone on to other awards buzz.
ANORA opens Friday, Nov. 1, in theaters.
RATING: 3.5 out of 4 stars
