Comment on The Men of Anora on a Bond Forged in Russia and Solidified in America

“I don’t speak Russian, but I understand it.” The line hits me like a gut punch as the first act of director Sean Baker‘s new movie Anora unfolds. It’s a line purred, albeit reluctantly, by the titular protagonist, Anora (Mikey Madison), a Russian-speaking, Uzbek-American sex worker—who prefers to be called the more Americanized nickname Ani—as her boss at a Manhattan strip club asks her to meet a new client: Ivan (Mark Eydelshteyn), the twenty-something son of a Russian oligarch. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] This line kicks into gear a modern Cinderella story gone horribly wrong (spoilers ahead): a torrid affair between Ani and Ivan (Vanya, for short) that explores systems of power, safety, love (ultimately), and the Russian diaspora of New York City. It’s also a line I know well; I have said it more times than I can count.

“Do you know Sean Baker?” While filming Aleksandr Andryushchenko’s sci-fi-adventure Guest from the Future in 2022, actor Yura Borisov asked this question of his co-star Mark Eydelshteyn. “No, I don’t know Sean Baker,” he replied. Borisov then explained to Eydelshteyn that Baker, the award-winning auteur behind The Florida Project and Tangerine, is “one of the most incredible independent directors in America.

In the 1980s, as Reagan reigned and the liberation movements of the previous two decades waned, respectable society lost its collective mind. Rumors of satanic cults spreading across the country were amplified by TV news personalities like Geraldo Rivera and treated as serious threats by the FBI. Daycare providers got dragged into absurd, widely publicized court cases alleging ritualistic child abuse.

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