Sean Baker is a graceful provocateur. No one seems fazed by him or what he creates—in fact, he couldn’t be more likable. In the anticipation of his seventh feature film, Anora, we were promised a tale of a sex worker—hardly a surprise given the director’s cinematic streak. With an innocuous sensibility, Baker stuck to what he knew, undoubtedly preserving the DNA of his previous conceptions—the perfect pairing of empathic and hilarious filmmaking.

The film's premise stands out in singular absurdity: a heartless young stripper meets the spoilt son of a Russian oligarch, strikes up a deal, and for an irresistible price, she agrees to be his girlfriend for the week.

It’s an utterly cursed, neo-realism take on the ‘Cinderella’ story; our leading lady, Anora (or Ani for short), played by Mikey Madison, is granted the once-in-a-lifetime chance to escape her hard-knock life, trading it in for the riches and wealth that come with being chosen by a rich man. But her dream-come-true quickly reveals itself as the start of a nightmare in a story about two avaricious people, just as foolish as each other.

Baker’s films pin a location and build from there. In Anora, we meet our titular lead in bustling Brooklyn, New York. Anora is tough and gritty, like the city itself. She wears the same uniform as every other Baker character before her, lower-class and looking for work. Anora spoils us with entertainment and utter trashy class. She’s a woman who knows how to get her way. She’s the people's diva. She’s a fierce heroine that could only exist in a film of this era.

My first foray into Sean Baker’s filmography was The Florida Project, a film that brims with humour and compassion. For its frank portrayal of the working class, it subsequently marked Baker a director with a 'social campaign.’ The ensemble cast merged veteran actors such as William Dafoe with actors that have never acted before, notably the film’s lead, Bria Vinaite, who was scouted online for the role. After the Florida Project followed the outrageous Red Rocket, which flaunts an array of charismatic and candid characters that command your attention until the film's conclusion. Eager for more, I watched Baker's breakthrough sophomore film Tangerine, and it all made sense. Baker's knack has always been his slapstick style of comedy, rooted in reality. The formula to his humour seems to be his focus on the set-up of it rather than its delivery. It’s all in the action, in every character's desperate attempt to save themselves from failure or fight for some slice of pleasure. It’s his vehicle of comedy, always veering towards the straight-up absurd: chaotic car chases, eruptive family drama, characters that challenge tradition.

Tangerine, shot on an iPhone camera and with the budget of an up-and-coming, undiscovered filmmaker, is the film I find Anora to be most reminiscent of. Both films resist any type of structure imposed on them, much like the characters inhabiting their world. Scenes unfold in a candid, Cinéma vérité style, with dialogue seeming improvised. The journey we’re taken on is that of an off-beat odyssey, reinvigorating what Indie filmmaking can and should do. 

No amount of money can compromise Baker's vision. In the midst of scepticism about his filmmaking style and how fitting it may be in the frame of commercial success, what Anora really champions is a creator who, thus far in his career, has resisted what a film must be or represent. The film is a flag of success that proves Baker shouldn’t have to shed his foundations and further that his stories can be trusted. That’s the cinematic milestone that Anora celebrates. A resilient filmmaker with an unfettered vision who never sought validation nor doubted his own potential. 

Many filmmakers will say that the compromise they often have to make is around casting, as a studio’s considerations are imposed with such force, often favouring reigning stars for the leads. Baker publicly declared that the credit he was most proud of for Anora was his cast; it’s clear he takes pride in his consecutive choices of non-traditional actors, often recycling actors he’s worked with before. Anora is Madison's first lead role to date and has quite literally plastered her face all over billboards, especially after the film won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. Maddison was copiously supported by an almost entirely undiscovered ensemble of actors, notably the young actor (and film's unlikely antagonist) Mark Eydelshteyn, who's similarly rose to fame.

It’s no secret that Baker has an interest in framing nonfiction in a fiction form. I find him an inquisitive individual, open to indulging his audience in a world they can’t otherwise access, not because they aren’t rich enough, but rather for the opposite. Few filmmakers have shown as consistent a dedication to portraying marginalised communities with dignity and complexity as Baker, namely his contemporaries Andrea Anrnold and Kelly Reichardt. The aforementioned are adjacent curators of stories that challenge their audience, untangle the thread of the American Dream, and leave us asking the bleak question: Does everyone get to have a happy ending? 

Baker is, evidently, committed to reframing and reconsidering the agenda of sex workers. One could view his fixations as sort of exploitative stimulation or an unveiling belief that sex work is real work. In Anora, Baker guides us through the doors of a strip club, a gesture that would otherwise be considered a real-world humiliation. The film allows us to identify with people we’d typically objectify, championing them as entertainers who excel in crafting an X-rated fantasy.

Anora certainly lacks the structure of The Florida Project, which led you through a more refined narrative journey and hence lent its characters more emotional potency. Understandably, that’s what many look for in a film-watching experience, and the absence of it can be reductive to its enjoyment. However, even if one doesn’t understand the hype, they should at least appreciate the immense effort of a filmmaker who, with blithe confidence, creates films that redefine the cinematic landscape and reimagine the narrative form. As for his social campaign, many other filmmakers would approach theirs with a respective seriousness, but Baker vouches for a roaring time, and Anora is no exception.