When I watched it for the second time I noticed some important details, such as Igor refusing to take Ani’s ring, I missed that on my first watch, and how Igor was always in the background experiencing and emphasizing with Ani throughout the movie. So this is a video for people who have already watched Anora to help them get a better understanding of this great movie. Here’s a link to the movie so if you haven’t watched it yet please watch the movie before watching my video.

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My non-spoiler review: Anora is truly a special movie worthy of winning Cannes and is the strongest contender of next year's Oscars. This might just look like another cliche Cinderella story but it goes so much far and beyond that. The emotional depth and authenticity that this movie achieves is indeed exceptional.

Sean Baker said that he had a rough idea of this movie in his mind for years, and that he wrote the script AFTER he casted main characters. This unique process is one of the reasons why the characters feel so natural, relatable, lovable, some go into dramatic character reveal and growth, some fail to grow, just like in real life.
As seen in his other movie Florida Project, Sean Baker is also a master at perspective. That paired with Mikey Madison’s amazing performance, which I’m sure she’ll win Best Actress, we follow Ani’s experience feeling a diverse range of emotions, butterflies in stomach, anticipation, exhilaration, tenderness, concern, fear, anger, anxiety, despair, sadness, defensiveness, and finally, vulnerability which shows hope for her road to healing.
Also I must add that the movie can get absolutely hilarious and creative! Starting at around the 48 minutes mark and lasting for 30 minutes shows perfectly choreographed emotional beats interwoven with slapstick humor and physical comedy.

Director Sean Baker can achieve such complex deep emotions because his genuine empathy for sex workers, raising social awareness to humanize them, and his pure hearted intention light up bright with main character Ani. Female characters are almost always used and sidelined for male character’s growth, are often reduced to flattened byte sized stereotypes for male dominated culture to conveniently consume (Madonna-whore complex, Gold digger, Damsel in Distress, Femme fatale, Angry Black woman, The Women in Refrigerators Trope… etc). Due to the visual nature of the film industry, female characters are often reduced to visual pleasure for men, but despite being a sex worker written by male director, Ani feels very real and multi-layered with emotions.
Ani is sexualized a lot, but isn’t reduced to male fantasy or projection and goes far beyond that as the film progresses. Allowing us to immerse and emphasize with her. The movie does take a realistic turn in a way that, that is one of Ani’s main challenges to overcome, as she constantly faces social stigma of a sex worker and many characters trying to reduce her identity as ‘just a dumb hollow gold digging whore’ and she vigorously fights for her identity. I do admit, clearly there is some part of that in her but Ani is so much more than just a gold digging whore. She's also incredibly brave, bright, colorful but most importantly, very human and vulnerable…a flawed human but worthy of respect and love just like every single one of us. 5 out of 5.
This is my favorite movie of the year although I might be biased because I also go by the name Annie.

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