ANORA – rated r

ANORA – Rated R – 2 hrs. 19 mins

WRITTEN & DIRECTED BY Sean Baker

STARRING:  Mikey Madison, Mark Eidelshtein, Paul Weissman, Vincent Radwinsky, Lindsey Normington and Anton Bitter

As this raunchy love-story of a film commences, we meet the bodacious stripper Ani (Mikey Madison), strolling through life without a care.  That is until the super-sexy young Russian about town Ivan (Mark Eidelshtein) steps into her life…turning her mundane existence upside down. 

When Ivan and Ani’s relationship expands way beyond the strip club, it seems that all of Ani’s dreams of the perfect life might be in reach, as Ivan takes his pretty woman all about town, adorning her with the finer things in life.  As Ani very quickly becomes accustomed to her new Cinderella existence, Ivan decides that he wants to make this arrangement permanent, as they head to a chapel in Vegas, to make their relationship official.

As the news of Ivan’s new relationship and marriage makes it back to Russia, Ivan’s bodyguards are tasked with not only keeping a closer eye on this youngster, but to annul the marriage he has just embarked upon with Ani…

Hell bent on continuing to live her fabulous new life with her husband, Ani isn’t going quietly into the night, as she combats Ivan’s henchmen, and his mother and father too, once they arrive here in the US.

As things start to heat up in every direction, Ani finally surmises that this new life she has been living, may not end up being everything Ivan promised it would be…or anything like she dreamed it would be…

I give ANORA 4 out of 5 Stars:   If you loved Mikey Madison’s crazy role in “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood”, then you are in for another joy ride of epic proportions, as she puts an additionally intense, and very manic character onto the screen, with this latest role.   Truth be told, ANORA would have fallen flat on its face without her incredible realism of life, and intimacy making it onto the screen, bringing Sean Baker’s storyline which he specifically  wrote for her, to life.  Along with Madison’s performance, Baker also managed to bring out enticing performances from almost everyone throughout the scenes of his latest NEON studio film.  Russian actor Mark Eidelshtein makes a splash on screen this time around too, as the son of a Russian Oligarch, here to live out his young, wild dreams in America.  Well, that is until his family arrives to mess up all of his best laid plans.  And whatever you do, please don’t plan on taking the kids to catch this R-rated film, as this film borderlines on soft porn throughout many of its scenes, making it definitely an adults-only viewing film!  There will be buzz about this film for weeks heading into awards season, so might I suggest that  you too should be flocking to a theatre near you to check out NEON studios latest creatively unhinged soon-to-be obsession…

Kathy Kaiser