Anora Review: Sean Baker바카라�s Oscar-sweeping anti-fairytale is both dazzling and depthless

Sean Baker, indie filmmakers바카라� darling, vaulted to the epicentre with Anora seizing five Academy Awards in a landslide triumph. It바카라�s a historic win for Baker, him becoming the first individual to grab four Oscars, ranging from directing to editing, for a single film. Anora is also the fourth Palme d바카라�Or-winning title in history to land Best Picture. While it바카라�s common for a select section of contenders to get a brief, rushed theatrical release in India during PVR INOX바카라�s annual Oscar Film Festival, Baker바카라�s film, despite its frontrunner status, was left out of the bunch. Initially slated for a November release, the theatrical release was kept hanging. Now, the film will have its OTT premiere later this month on JioHotstar.

To anyone who바카라�s seen the film, the theatrical stalemate holds no surprise. Stacked with nudity and sex, Anora couldn바카라�t have made past the CBFC without extensive cuts, and hence alienating its Indian distributor over mutilations. Built around a Brooklyn stripper and escort, Ani (Mikey Madison in an utterly magnetic, galvanic, Oscar-winning turn), Baker tracks her journey towards dizzying hope-and eventual heartbreak. Her routine seems to change course when a young Russian client, Vanya (Mark Eydelshteyn acing the irresistible red-flag energy), son of a loaded Russian oligarch, is so charmed he proposes marriage. For Ani, living as she has been with tightened straits, the allure of wholly reorienting her destiny, a life cushioned by not having to stress over surviving, making through another day, is impossible to resist. She, too, falls for him.

Baker has made a career out of foregrounding the marginalized. Right from The Florida Project, he바카라�s sought to evoke their joys and anguish and dreams daring to defy their circumstances. However, Anora registers as the first outing where his interests in the protagonist, the world she occupies and tries to climb out of, land as glib, as slight and fleeting as the glitter Ani drapes herself in. Baker, having also edited the film, infuses the film with brash energy, a thrilling dynamism. The film chugs ahead furiously, as if to capture Ani바카라�s surging hopes that will not pause for reflection, any second thoughts on the high improbabilities of her romance. In its first half, Anora breathlessly plays out like a chase film, hurdling through dramatic, decisive moments in quick succession. A detour to Vegas for the marriage, the return to Vanya바카라�s fancy mansion-Ani바카라�s giddy thrills, a dreamy spell with seemingly endless money and comfort are cut off by the world kicking in. When Vanya바카라�s parents get wind of these sudden events, they send a bunch of henchmen to 바카라�fix바카라� the issue, annul the marriage. Ani바카라�s bright, shiny bubble with Vanya bursts.

However, in all the film바카라�s leaping verve, Ani바카라�s dash towards the marriage, her impulsive choices and too-enormous faith in someone as irresponsible as Ivan, aren바카라�t always plausibly grounded. Anora strains to be funny, frantic, riffing on the screwball form. Occasionally, it바카라�s undeniably exhilarating but too often, certain gags come off forced, like the pose Russian characters exert who are either bumbling or flat-out tropey in stressing menace. Ani projects a canny exterior, knowing how to play her clients around, but Baker increasingly diverts from any intelligence, wariness she might have. As a result, the film renders her so spotlessly credulous in her devotion to Vanya, her belief in his word, it becomes a tall ask to fully buy into the shimmer of their love story. Ani strikes as a strangely unprobed wisp of a character, only half-realized.

Luckily, Baker pulls the brakes in its final half-hour. It바카라�s a marvellous tonal switch anchored by Yura Borisov바카라�s quietly winning turn as Igor, one of the Russian henchmen tasked with handling Vanya바카라�s rash marriage that바카라�s put his family in distress. As a shattered Ani reckons with a brutal reminder of her place in the world, Borisov navigates these scenes with delicacy and compassion. It바카라�s a wonder to watch how a seemingly peripheral character slowly edges to the very center while Ani바카라�s romance unravels. The actor바카라�s gentle presence soaks Anora in soft reassurance, a growing trust that has long evaded Ani. This hushed coda, with the year바카라�s most wrenching ending, rescues the film to some degree, filling it with the light of tenderness, acknowledgment and comfort. Yet, it바카라�s not enough, for Baker keeps up a veil between the viewer and Ani. Madison is spectacular, slickly oscillating and achingly vulnerable, by turns, but remains wedged within Baker바카라�s free-ranging directorial design, denied inhabiting Ani바카라�s entire, bristling personhood. For all the dazzle on display, Anora digs barely skin-deep.