By: Amit kumaR Agarwal
The Actress and The Director
Mikey Madison with Sean Baker
Anora was the film everyone was talking about last year, 2024 at the biggest film event on planet earth - Cannes Film Festival. The press particularly was quite polarized after the first screening - with many, 'all gung ho' about Anora winning the top prize at the Cannes; another set dismissing the film as just a rehash of Pretty Woman.
First things first anyone that equates Anora with Pretty Woman, ought to take cinema classes - the two films are as different from each other, as chalk and cheese - not only in narrative - but the very basics like plot-points and characterization.
The fact that in seven-decades+ history of Cannes and Oscars - only four films have won the top honors - Anora being the fourth, says a lot about the films' seemingly simple narrative that in essence is very complex.
So what made Anora tick - other than the perfect casting - it is the vulnerability of the principal characters that resonated with the audiences globally. For example Igor - he is not a brute, he can be a brute - but in essence he has got a very soft side to him. There is no doubt that his character is more vulnerable than Anora.
The biggest night in entertainment may have come to a close, almost six-weeks now; but Anora's win is still provoking fierce debate online, with many stunned that the movie won the Best Film. This mixed reaction is only contributing to an avid audience interest in Anora - what the frenzy is all about. Fact is, art can’t “win” or “lose” - the very fact that a film-maker has made a film and released it, ought to be lauded - but with internet and social media making everyone a critic - the talk around Anora's emphatic win, will not die.
To top it, Mikey Madison won Best Actress as well - prompting many to start online trolls, touting, Demi Moore for her act in The Substance as more worthy of the award!
Frankly, Cannes and Oscars have a strong inclination of awarding films with vulnerable female protagonists. There constant struggle to redeem themselves, find themselves - if there is such a film competing - 99% of the times such a film will win big.
Blue Is The Warmest Color shocked the audiences globally, when it won at Cannes about a decade back - many attribute the film's failure to win an Oscar nomination to the academy rules - but I feel even if it was nominated for Oscars it would've failed to win as the film was too explicit for the 'perceived prudishness' at the Oscars.
While the debate will rage on, the producers of Anora ought to be lauded for executing a near-perfect Oscar campaign - this campaign will surely be a part of film-schools teaching marketing in times to come!
What is Anora?
Anora is an independent movie directed by Sean Baker. It follows the story of Anora, played by Mikey Madison; a sex worker, she marries a Russian oligarch’s son.
The film subtly tells the struggle of Anora for a better life. The closing shot of the film, without a single-dialogue, nails it and I feel the vulnerability and the subtext is what resonated with the jury of various awards to make Anora both a critical and commercial success.