Anora (2024) Review: Cinderella Meets the Henchmen

Is Anora worth watching?

Yes, absolutely. Anora is a thrilling, hilarious and finally moving film, a modern screwball comedy about money and class that becomes something far deeper, and Mikey Madison gives one of the great lead performances of recent years. Sean Baker takes a Cinderella premise, lets the audience enjoy the fantasy, and then sends in reality in the form of three increasingly flustered henchmen. If there is a reservation, it is that the opening party stretch runs long, and the film’s shift in tone will catch some viewers off guard. That shift is also its genius.

What is Anora about?

Ani (Mikey Madison) is a young woman from Brighton Beach who works as a stripper at a Manhattan club. One night she is introduced to Vanya (Mark Eydelshteyn), the carefree, hard-partying son of a Russian oligarch, because she speaks some Russian. He hires her for more, then for a week, and in a haze of parties, private jets and Las Vegas, the two impulsively get married. When word of the wedding reaches Vanya’s parents in Russia, their fixers in New York, including the Armenian-American Toros (Karren Karagulian) and the quiet heavy Igor (Yura Borisov), are sent to get the marriage annulled, and a long, chaotic night across the city begins.

Anora is written, directed and edited by Sean Baker. It is an American production, largely in English with a good deal of Russian, and runs 139 minutes. It won the Palme d’Or at Cannes in 2024 and five Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actress, with Baker personally winning four of them in a single night.

A fairy tale with the lights left on

Baker has spent his career making films about people on the margins of American life, from Tangerine to The Florida Project, and Anora is his most exuberant and most accessible. The first act is shot and cut like a party that never ends: neon clubs, a mansion full of video games, a delirious trip to Vegas. It is seductive on purpose, because the film wants us to understand why Ani might believe in the dream, and to feel the ground shift when the dream’s owners come to collect.

When the henchmen arrive, the film turns into one of the best-sustained farces in years. A single extended sequence in Vanya’s mansion, full of shouting, broken furniture and absurd misunderstandings, is as funny as anything in modern American comedy. Baker’s editing gives it the rhythm of a door-slamming stage comedy, but every laugh also sharpens the question of who has power and who does not.

Mikey Madison’s ferocious star turn

Madison makes Ani tough, funny, loud and fiercely proud, a woman who has learned to protect herself by never showing weakness. She commits to the physical comedy with total abandon, and she makes Ani’s refusal to be treated as disposable the film’s moral centre. Her Best Actress Oscar was thoroughly earned.

The supporting cast is superb. Eydelshteyn plays Vanya as a charming, weightless boy who has never faced a consequence. Karagulian’s Toros is a masterclass in comic exasperation, and Borisov, Oscar-nominated for the role, gives Igor a stillness and watchfulness that slowly become one of the film’s quiet surprises.

A comedy that knows what it is about

Beneath the farce, Anora is angry about class: about the way wealth treats working people, especially working women, as temporary and replaceable. What makes the film special is that it never lectures. The anger lives inside specific, funny, contradictory people, and the film treats sex work plainly and without judgement. The one minor limitation is the length of the opening stretch, which lingers on the party a little longer than it needs to, though the payoff justifies most of it.

Who should watch Anora?

It is for anyone who loves sharp, character-driven comedy with emotional weight, and for fans of independent American cinema. It is strictly for adults: there is extensive nudity and sexual content, constant strong language, drug use and some scuffling violence. Give it your full attention through to the final scene, which is the key to everything that comes before.

If it wins you over, consider:

• The Apartment, Billy Wilder’s classic of comedy, class and loneliness in New York.
• City Lights, Chaplin’s great romance about poverty, wealth and a fantasy that cannot last.

The verdict

Anora is a near-perfect blend of screwball energy, social anger and tenderness, a comedy that builds to a genuinely unforgettable emotional payoff. Sean Baker’s direction and Mikey Madison’s fearless lead make it a modern American classic.

Rating: 5/5