Reviewing Sean Baker's Anora

SPOILERS: This post contains spoilers for the movie 'Anora', so if you haven't seen the movie yet, and you care about spoilers, this post contains spoilers!!
DISCLAIMER: I fell asleep halfway through the movie, so this review is not that complete or accurate. But I got the general gist of the thing. 





1 I saw this movie with my mom...

I saw Anora with my mom on Friday. At first, it was extremely awkward because of all the a$$-shots and twerking and sexiness galore. The movie opens with a long, lingering shot of strippers twerking on various affluent-looking men, businessmen in Manhattan, presumably, seeking some pleasure after a long day at work. I was uncomfortable from the opening shot, because I was watching the movie with my mom. The next movie I'm seeing with her will probably be Wicked, a) because I want to see Ariana Grande/am curious about her acting and b) because it will make her trust that I can watch appropriate movies with her. I told my mom that my friend told me to see this movie, and by the end of the first act (drugs, sex), she told me that I shouldn't be friends with that friend anymore (he's pretty much my only friend, aside from oomfs). She was like "I don't trust [my friend] anymore. >:L" 

However, for all the drugs and sex that occurred in the 1st act of the movie, my mom seemed to come around to the movie by the second act (which wikipedia I think describes as a screwball comedy, idk I might have gotten that from a Youtube comment or summat), and she was even laughing during the scene where Anora was being held hostage by Igor & co. The whole theater (which consisted of about ten people, I feel like) was laughing at that point. I, however, had already started getting a little sleepy at that point and I think I started to fall asleep during that scene. I think I was also sleeping as a way of escape because I thought the whole movie was going to be twerking and a$$ and I couldn't bear watching that the whole way through with my mom. SO I FELL ASLEEP OKAY. Hopefully no Anora stans come for me.

And my mom really seemed to "understand" the movie by the end of the movie. Or at least those were her words. I asked her if she actually liked the movie by the end of the movie, because that's what I told my friend happened, and she just said she "understood" the movie by the end of the movie. I am not sure why she said she understood the movie by the end of the movie. All I saw of the end of the movie was the part where Anora and Igor are in a car and she appears to be riding him or summat, and she starts crying. That's when I woke up. At the end of the movie, my mom told me I could still continue being friends with my non-oomf friend, because she said summat about "it all" (presumably Anora's relationship with Ivan) being "an illusion", and the drugs and sex were also all part of that illusion. I would also presume, from watching Tangerine, that the ending, like a YouTuber said, was like a gut punch, which is typical I feel at the end of a Sean Baker movie (having only seen two Sean Baker movies). 

2 Is it love? Or is it lust? What's the difference, anyway? 


I think a major theme in this movie, or at least the part of the movie that I saw (again, I fell asleep halfway through the movie) is the difference between lust and love. I've been considering this over the past few days, and I feel like, contrary to traditional opinion, lust and love are intertwined and not necessarily extricable from each other. Does Ivan really love Anora in the 1st act of the movie, prompting them to elope? Or was it really just for the green card? I really do believe he (Ivan/Vanya) had some degree of tenderness for her, no matter how much there could actually exist in his prepubescent body, even if it was a lot of lusting. (Again, it was extremely uncomfortable watching all those graphic sex scenes with my mom. If you haven't seen this movie yet, the 1st act of the movie was extremely graphic). 

There was also the drugs. As always, drugs can cloud any relationship. I kept watching Ivan hit his weed vape during the first act of the movie, and thought, wow, that was me like as a teenager. Lol. But at least in the part that I saw, there was a lot of drugs, and a lot of sex. It was quite voyeuristic. Idk. It was a lot more voyeuristic than Tangerine, at least, where there was only Tina smoking towards the end of the movie and a cigarette smoking scene towards the beginning of the movie. I really felt like I was seeing something pornographic, something that I shouldn't be seeing, ESPECIALLY NOT WITH MY MOM. If you are thinking of seeing this movie, I would recommend not seeing it with your mom. Idk, it depends on what relationship you have with your mom. 

Despite falling asleep, I get the gist that over the course of the movie, Anora comes to the realization that whatever sexual relationship she had with Ivan was not only clouded in marijuana smoke, but also a fever dream that had no love in it. I don't know, maybe she had never known love before, and thought that the euphoria of eloping was it. But it turns out, that was not it. I also learned from reading Wikipedia or maybe a YouTube comment that Igor slowly falls in love with Anora throughout the second half of the movie, concluding in their consummation in the sedan at the finale of the film. 



3 Sex work before the camera lens

Incidentally, this movie got the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, which if I'm not mistaken is the highest award that a director can get at the Cannes. For all the sex work that was depicted in the film, and for all that Sean Baker is known for championing sex workers in his films and trying to destigmatize sex work, I couldn't help but feel like the sex work depicted in Anora was kind of exploitative. There is a line between exploitative and voyeuristic for the sake of titillating the audience and being edgy, and actually trying to create sympathy for the sex worker. I felt like the movie was veering slightly towards the side of titillating the audience and being edgy. Idk. Maybe this is a bad take and I'll get dragged. I feel like he (Sean Baker) ultimately did a successful job of depicting the eponymous sex worker, Anora (or Ani), because my mom came around in the end and seemed to sympathize with Anora, who I only saw was crying by the end of the movie. Again, I can only mostly go off of how my mom reacted to the movie, because I didn't actually see most of the movie.  

It kind of leads to the question of, is sex in a movie ever really necessary? Maybe I'm just a prude, but I just feel like it was really uncomfortable watching all those sex scenes with my mom. Maybe I didn't have to see this movie with my mom. But kind of like how I feel like cigarette smoking (and in this case, weed vaping) is glamorized in films because it's cool to look at, I feel like a similar thing happens with unrealistic amounts of heightened sex that occurs in movies, or at least this movie, because it's something that is shocking or mildly traumatic for the audience to look at. The sex scenes were very raw and graphic, and I feel like the topic of sex work, though more mainstream in recent years than ever before, is still relatively unknown and not understood by the general public. Even my mom (not to bring up my mom again...), was kind of like curious about how sex work works in America after the movie ended. She was wondering if it was a legitimate legal form of work, and I told her that stripping is, but I don't think prostitution technically is, except in places like Vegas. 

All in all, I felt like the portrayal of sex work was very raw and real in the movie, and any portrayal at all adds to the conversation surrounding sex work, which probably works to destigmatize it to some degree in the end. I felt personally uncomfortable with the way the movie opened with such graphic portrayals of it, but maybe that was a sort of shock value that is meant to draw audiences into the movie, to be magnetic in a way. 

4 In Conclusion

In conclusion, I felt like the movie was probably good. At least there's a lot of buzz about it online, especially with the whole controversy surrounding Ivy Wolk lately, which I still don't fully understand. (All I know is the clip posted onto X saying "Meet Crystal", and for days afterwards everyone seemed to know Ivy Wolk. I didn't even know all that was connected to Anora at first). 

I would give the movie a 6/10. I think Tangerine was like 8/10, but maybe that's just because I relate more to the Los Angeles setting, and like the depiction of a little-depicted neighborhood of LA. Maybe other people would rate Anora higher. I just had a pretty uncomfortable experience watching the movie with my mom and fell asleep halfway through, but maybe the movie is meant to be uncomfortable and difficult to watch. Overall, if given the chance, I would re-watch the movie, and I am looking forward to seeing more work from Sean Baker in the future, mostly because I loved Tangerine tho and not necessarily Anora. The next time Sean Baker comes out with a movie, remind me to not watch it with my mom. 


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