“Please stop screaming.” Igor (Yura Borisov)
The dramady Anora is a scream throughout with high-octane nightclub scenes dominating the first half at least. During that drug and drink-fueled introduction, we meet the titular (Mikey Madison) sex worker, stripper, exotic dancer, and escort, who just seems hipper and smarter than her colleagues and clients. Her Uzbek-American lineage earns her an introduction to a Russian-oligarch scion, Vanya (Mark Eidelstein). Quick marriage in gaudy Vegas promises a Cinderella future as the director Sean Baker, not a stranger to depicting sex workers (see red Rocket), characterizes it.
After this, the real comedy kicks in as the family comes over from Russia to annul the marriage. A variety of family relatives and thugs find the high-spirited Ani not easy to separate from her new life that attaches itself to theirs immediately. Although a green card might have been Vanya’s motive, he doesn’t seem to have the energy to think that smartly. Rather, he values the drugs and mostly awkward sexuality from Ani.
Ani values this newfound life with its four-carat engagement ring and release from sex working. She screams and bites her way to almost-freedom until the only ally seems to be thug Igor. Writer-director Sean Baker nicely integrates this dissenter while the rest of the Rusky entourage tries to corral Ani and get her to sign the divorce papers. The conflict between Russian patriarchy, especially Vanya’s mom and dad, and the couple emphasizes the value difference between the males and the feisty, independent Ani.
The high-pitched screaming and humorous verbiage make for an echo of the absurd Keystone-Cops’ movies now translated into amusing tough-guy epithets. Manhattan, tourist-empty Coney Island, and Brighton Beach locales as well as blazing scarlet touches comic character while it also comments on cultural differences between two enemies from the centuries past.
This soul of the Safdie-like romp is Mikey Madison’s Ani, combining the best of female Jewish comedians like the low humor of Sarah Silverman andc Don Rickles. Vanyo is played by Mark Eidelstein as a Timothee Chalamet and Jesse Eisenberg mashup. Add the father’s factotum Toros (Karren Karagulian) for heavy and humorous lifting and his quiet bud Garnick (Vache Tovmasyan) and you have a complete bungling cast.
And a classic cross-cultural screwball comedy for our time.
Anora
Director: Sean Baker (Florida Project, Red Rocket, Tangerine)
Screenplay: Baker
Cast: Mikey Madison (Scream 2022)
Rating: R
Length: 2h 19m
John DeSando, a Los Angeles Press Club first-place winner for National Entertainment Journalism, hosts NPR’s It’s Movie Time and Cinema Classics as well as podcasts Back Talk and Double Take (recently listed by Feedspot as two of the ten best NPR Movie Podcasts) out of WCBE 90.5 FM, Columbus, Ohio. Contact him at JohnDeSando52@gmail.com