TIFF Review: Mikey Madison’s Performance in ‘Anora’ Will Blow You Away

Synopsis: Anora, a young sex worker from Brooklyn, gets her chance at a Cinderella story when she meets and impulsively marries the son of an oligarch. Once the news reaches Russia, her fairytale is threatened as the parents set out for New York to get the marriage annulled.
Director: Sean Baker
Stars: Mikey Madison, Mark Eydelshteyn, Karren Karaguilan, Vache Tovmasyan

At this year’s Toronto International Film Festival, Anora was among the most anticipated movies. For many, its allure stemmed from winning the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival, the most prestigious award at France’s famous annual fête of cinema.

While the Palm d’Or victory excites many, for some, including myself, the excitement stems from the fact that it is a new film from Sean Baker. The director has been making films for over 20 years, but his most recent trio of films—Tangerine, The Florida Project, and Red Rocket— have garnered a lot of attention.

Baker has set himself apart as a filmmaker who focuses his lens on marginalized people and gives them a voice.

In the opening scene at a strip club a remix of The Greatest Day by the British group Take That perfectly sets the stage. We meet Anie (Mikey Madison), a stripper working at the club. Anie isn’t a prisoner of this lifestyle; she appears to be thriving in it. She exudes confidence and knows how to handle customers. While ‘‘stripper’’ may not have been on her bingo card, she is making the best of it.

Baker presents this environment in a unique way. The audience knows where they are, but from the start, he gives the dancers a voice.

The opening few moments also suggest that Anie is not the best roommate. Did you not pick up the milk? That is not her focus; surviving is.

Consistent with all his movies, Baker has done his research to ensure the scenes in the club are as authentic as they can be. He even had sex workers on staff as consultants.

Anie can handle herself and has settled comfortably into life. She sleeps the day away and works into the wee hours of the morning. One night, Anie is at the club, and she meets a customer who speaks Russian. Her Russian is not terrible, and she reluctantly cuts her break short to go and entertain him.

Vanya (Mark Eydelshteyn), while close to her in age, seems very immature. But he has money, and apparently a lot of it.

Anie gives him some private dances at the club, and when he pays her to visit his home, we realize she also makes house calls. Anie is impressed with Vanya’s wealth—the big house, maids, etc., and he seems to be taken by the attractive Anie. Vanya then hires her to come to parties and to pose as his girlfriend, and while they party and do drugs, they also have sex regularly, all for a fee.

Vanya is set to go back to Russia but is reluctant to do so. He suggests they get married so he can stay in the United States. Attracted to this new lifestyle, Anie agrees, and they get married in Las Vegas.

It turns out that Vanya is the son of an Oligarch and has a history of being impulsive. His parents catch wind of their sons’ activities and decide to travel to the U.S. to deal with the unsettling news.

The first hour of the film focusses on establishing Anie’s character and her ‘‘courtship’’ with Vanya. Eydelshteyn convincingly plays the role of the barely-through-puberty young man who, at times, sounds like a Borat rip-off. He’s authentically clueless. After sex, he just wants to play video games or do drugs. Still, Anie is taken by what her life could become.

In the second half of the film, chaos breaks out. With news of his parents coming to New York, Vania flees, leaving Anie to deal with the repercussions. Vanya’s father tasks Garnick (Vache Tovmasyan) and Igor (Yura Broisov), two men he seems to care little about despite their unwavering loyalty. The men, along with Toros and longtime Baker collaborator Karren Karagulian, spend the night looking everywhere for Vanya.

There are many things that make Anora incredibly captivating. Mikey Madison delivers one of the best performances of the year. She nails a New Jersey accent and its clear that she conducted lots of research on the sex trade; however, it’s the range of emotions she portrays on screen that truly captivates. Anie is tough, and she is a survivor, but like most people with a hard shell, you know there is a soft centre somewhere.

Respectfully, there was nothing about Madison’s performance in Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, a strong ensemble film, that made her stand out, but then again, I’m not a Palm d’Or winning director. This performance exemplifies that sometimes it takes the right director to bring out the best performance from an actor. It’s as if Baker made the movie around her. Anora is easily the best performance of Mikey Madison’s career.

Sean Baker continues to be a filmmaker that I truly appreciate. His films give a voice to the voiceless and, many times, serve a gut punch, a reminder of how unfair society can be. His lens is one that reflects a world that most don’t get to see. Millions of people flock to Disneyland every year, but it was his film The Florida Project that displayed a family living in poverty just a stone’s throw from the happiest place on earth.

His film Red Rocket examines what happens to someone when they have everything, lose it and rebuild their life. These are stories that are seldom told and rarely conveyed with the care and affection that Baker gives his characters. These previous films have been well received, but Anora stands on the shoulders of the others. Anora takes the audience on an emotional journey, and in the last five minutes of the film, Madison, without saying a word, cements why she may have delivered the best performance of the year.

Recency bias says this is the best Sean Baker movie of all time; at the very least, Anora is easily one of the best movies of 2024; it’s a film that will stay with you.

Grade: A

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