Anora
Screwball comedy by Sean Baker (The Florida Project) about an erotic dancer hired by a Russian billionaire’s son to play his girlfriend; the start of a hilarious adventure. Winner of the Golden Palm at Cannes.
Stripper Ani gets her chance at a Cinderella story when Vanya, an exuberantly friendly goofball, hires her for paid sex. Vanya turns out to be the young son of a Russian oligarch who – while his parents are in Russia – generously spends money and throws lavish parties in New York. Soon Vanya asks if he can hire Ani to be his girlfriend for a week. The smart and sassy Ani negotiates well and manages to extract a $15,000 fee. When Vanya also asks her to marry him, the fairy tale seems complete. But then the wedding news reaches Russia...
With the equally humorous and humanistic ANORA, Sean Baker breathes new life into the screwball comedy: a film genre that was especially popular in the 1930s and 1940s. A screwball comedy centres on the frictions between two people (often, as in ANORA, from different classes). Other features include sharp, pointed dialogue and farcical situations. At the award ceremony in Cannes, Sean Baker dedicated his prize to all sex workers, according to him an unjustly stigmatised profession that occupies a more central place in our society than we care to admit. (mv)