Sean Baker’s Best Picture winning film deserves its own post. The winner of five Oscars, and the reward for perseverance from Neon, is a loud, brave, boisterous representation of a dream realized, and seeing the potential for that very dream to slip away. Initially, neon provided me a screener for this without audio description, so I was able to glean something in time to vote. later, i ended up owning a digital copy with audio description, because Baker is an auteur. Whether he likes it or not, there’s something in the connective tissue of his works, where he elevates the forgotten class and makes them into heroes. whether his hero are a pair of transgender sex workers, a little girl growing up too fast while living in a rundown hotel, a washed up porn star, or Annie, the blisteringly funny Mikey Madison, who sees a light at the end of the tunnel, only to find out that perhaps the light was never really there.
Baker loves to tell the stories no one else seems willing to tell, and catches attention from cinephiles and critics for his audacity in propelling the least likely protagonist to the front of the pack. In Anora, Baker has Annie, who is working at a strip club, catch the attention of a young oligarch’s son, who hires her to spend some time with him in his mansion. As the two start spending more time together, he seemingly wants this party to never stop, and instead of continuing to pay Annie for her time, proposes. Cinderella has found her questionable prince.
This sets off a chain reaction of Russians invading their lives, when it is revealed that the son of this Russian dynasty proposed to a prostitute. To be fair, Annie isn’t seen throughout the film sleeping with different men, but is rather presented as an opportunistic stripper, who isn’t going to say no to a couple thousand dollars from an awkward Russian.
This is where I deviate from everyone else, because I’ve seen this film twice, and I could not pick a single supporting performance out of the gaggle of Russians. It is clear that Mikey is slaying every frame, but at any given time,a different actor is bouncing off her like the perfect scene partner. I don’t know how the awards circuit landed on just one person. This cast is why the Oscars need that Ensemble award that the Screen Actors Guild has, because sometimes, the work is being done by a lot of people, and they all contribute to the greater cause.
But, Madison in the title role is electric. She wasn’t even my favorite female lead performance of the year, due in large part to the amount of excellent roles written last year for female leads. But, she’s deserving of recognition. Honestly, Anora fell short of my top 10 films as well, however the film did make my Top 28. And, while Sean Baker didn’t win my director list, he is in the top 10.
I wonder in the long run if Anora will be Sean Baker’s best film, or if he still has even greater works to come. what I felt from Anora was a director on the continuous rise, and I thought at least Baker will finally gain some recognition for being a very consistent director. But, he won, and now feels like the next generation of auteurs. As we watch Scorsese, Scott, Coppola, Eastwood, and others age into the “is this the last film?” Territory, we need bright and bold voices like Baker.
the audio description, now that we’re pretty limited to home viewing, for me was well written, but not well mixed. There were maybe a few times during some of the peak chaotic moments where I wanted more from the description, but I noticed primarily when scenes got loud, the audio for the film was defeating the audio description track. This could be specific to my purchase through the Apple Store, or this could be how Neon mixed the film for digital release.
So if you have been waiting for my thoughts on the winner of Best Picture, this is it. It is an excellent film, from an excellent director, that just fell a little shy of my personal top 10. But, since I saw over 450 titles released in 2024, coming even close to the top 10 puts you in a very elite percentage.
Fresh: Final Grade: A, Audio Description: B