Reality is a B*tch

Navigating my thoughts on Anora (2024)

In October of 2024, I was able to attend an early screening of Sean Baker’s newest film Anora. As a Sean Baker fan, I was thrilled. Anora had been my most anticipated film of the year, and yet when I left I felt a lack. I felt like a scooped out peach pit. Just the day before I witnessed Mikey Madison hosting a private screening of the film for sex workers. I watched as they clapped the back of their heels when the film ended. I thought, boy, this film is FOR sex workers. Yet, I felt anything but that. I saw the film again and felt the same way: empty. What was wrong with me? My two best friends, I saw it with, raved about it when it was over. I fell silent and for the first time in my life I shut the fuck up. I didn’t know what to say.

If I’m going into a movie knowing it’s about sex workers, why do I feel like I know nothing about the industry? Is this Sean Baker's way of taking a step back, too afraid to dip into the world of that nature? If he had attempted to dip into the world, would his viewpoint be drenched in misogyny? Is there a way a white upper class man could tell a story about a 23-year-old sex worker in New York City? I think the dissatisfaction with the film is not from the glorification or lack of glorification of sex work, it is the complete disregard for it. Of course, it doesn’t feel like Ani’s story, it isn’t. It’s everyone’s story, chasing the American dream. Baker uses Ani as a vessel to move this theme along.

Sean Baker is not new to this. In his film Starlet (2012), a young pornstar finds herself with $10,000 she found inside of a water bottle at an old woman’s garage sale. She then goes back to the house to return the money, but instead develops a bond with the old woman. In Red Rocket (2021) Rex, a washed up pornstar begins sleeping with his ex-wife to form a false relationship and con his way into having a place to stay. It seems as if his characters are always chasing something unattainable to them. Undeniably, their line of work is what pigeonholes them. It is also important to note (something we will touch on later) that Baker is a realist filmmaker. He captures the rawness of reality, very rarely giving his characters happy endings.

Anora is just the same. Ani finds an opportunity to escape her mundane life and uses it to her advantage. I do not think Ani ever had feelings for Vanya, but rather the life he could have given her. It is clear in their fast-paced, undesirable sex. The way he barely pays attention to her, too busy with his video games and dab pen. There is a moment when Vanya yells at her before getting on the plane. At this moment, something clicks with Ani, she realizes who she is and who she cannot be due to her lifestyle. This is especially present when Ani threatens to sue and Vanya’s mom dismisses it by telling Ani she has nothing. Ani realizes that there is nothing material in her life. One of the biggest reversals of this is in the marital office when Ani gives Vanya her fur coat back. She is active in that decision. She is allowed to be on the other side of transactional love. While this is such a big moment for Ani, Vanya sloppily gives it to the marital office worker. This downplays the triumphant moment for Ani, juxtaposing the action for both of them. He never cared about money or Ani. This theme of transactional love is riddled throughout.

The goons are the same status as Ani. Both Igor and Garnik use their bodies (protection and violence) for money. They get walked over by Vanya and his family. This is similar to Toros as well. He represents the middle class. He is below Vanya’s family but above Ani and the goons. He is running around the entire film, panicking, all to appease Vanya’s family. He is chasing the lifestyle he wants. He is appeasing to the rich, in hopes of being like them. When they leave the destroyed mansion to go find Vanya, Toros hands the maid a wad of cash as a way to apologize for the mess. He is using the money he does have, to position himself as someone with power. All the while, he is being used by Vanya’s family. Another powerful moment is when he is in the diner. An American flag hangs behind him as he is telling a group of young people how bad their work ethic is. He explains how hard he has had to work and that they would never understand. His lecturing is a way to cope with the fact that he is exhausted of this chase, while also asserting power above them.

Even in this analysis we turn away from Ani, ultimately showing how little this story is about her. You could dissect every character in this film. Undoubtedly, it shows how great of a writer Sean Baker is. Yet, the film is “supposed” to be about sex work. Of course there’s flashy dance scenes and club scenes, but that’s all we get. The story starts when she leaves the club and it ends when she realizes it is not a substantial lifestyle. So, yes, Ani is a sex worker in this film. Yes, she slides down the pole and gives lap dances and charges for sexual acts, but this is just the set up for who she is. Something we don’t technically get to see unless it is in the eyes of the men around her.

This is a frustrating aspect about the film. I have not fully cemented my “male gaze” opinions in Anora. Laura Mulvey’s essay talks mainly about how the camera positions itself for women on screen to satisfy men. I don’t necessarily think that the camera is positioned in a male gaze fantasy. Its focus is purely on Ani. However, the gaze we get from Igor is what pushes me in the other direction. He “sees” her and is the only one to see her. It is the most unrealistic aspect of this film that a man, Igor, is finally the one to truly see Ani. Not her friends at the strip club, not her sister, etc. The one thing we do know about Ani is that she hates reality. Maybe instead of viewing Igor as the male gaze, the audience should view him as reality. Instead of insisting that Ani is a bitch for her coldness towards him, maybe she is frightened by the fact that he is reflection of her reality in this fantasy she is living in. He acts as this looming force, always watching her, until she is completely faced with it at the end. For example, the profile shot in the car flips into a head-on shot, Ani staring directly at him, succumbing to the harshness. Additionally, something to consider: What if Igor was a woman, would this male gaze discourse still exist?

I don’t think Igor is supposed to be considered as a prince charming for Anora. He makes her realize that there is NO prince charming. This is why she breaks down, not because of Vanya, but because reality catches up to her. This applies to Baker’s aforementioned film style of neorealism. I am not sure that if Ani got her happy ending, the movie would be as successful. This opens a larger question, why is a woman’s pain exploited constantly in film? Baker himself said that the ending shows Ani at her rawest form. I hate that. Why is her truest form beaten down? Women’s pain is laughed at and that is apparent in the mansion break-in scene. Anora is brutalized and right when it begins to get serious she “cries rape.” I was disgusted by that scene and I think it is a complete male view of how a woman acts in dangerous situations. Yet, the theater was cracking up.

Viewing this film as a story about class structure reconsiders a lot of discourse about this film. It also adds a lot of nuance as well. We have to pay attention to what is on screen. What are the colors, mood, costumes, lighting, editing, etc? If we pay attention to this aspect, it is clear the film does not demonize sex work. It doesn’t glorify it either by the harsh ending. I don’t think Baker paints Anora in a bad light, but I also don’t think it’s a feminist masterpiece. I have so many “I don’t know,” feelings about this film. I have thought about it so much, even after my third viewing. Maybe we are not supposed to know Ani completely. Maybe this is just a glimpse of someone desiring something more for themselves, just to be knocked right back. Anora, is our own reflection of how reality is a bitch sometimes.