Winter is a season of two halves. The beginning of winter is during the run-up to Christmas. Although a Christian festival, it is almost impossible to avoid the festivity of Christmas in the Western world. There is the idyllic image of the White Christmas ingrained into the subconscious and reflected in films set at Christmas. Likewise, there is an array of New Year’s Eve, a time of new life and celebration. However, the other half of winter is set in the long, drawn-out period of the Christmas and New Year festivities. This winter is cold, frosty, icy, barren. It is where the fun and joy of Christmas are long gone, we have all returned to work, and the thought of rest bite is long away; we are all waiting for the return of the spring, for green to return to our trees and a flourish of new life to beckon.
While Sean Baker has dabbled in setting his films in winter, such as his Christmas film, “Tangerine,” his most recent work, “Anora,” is a complete and detailed depiction of winter on screen. The film opens with Ani performing at a strip club, her place of work, to the sound of a remixed version of Take That’s “Greatest Day.” It is a choice of needle drop that is naively optimistic that despite the improbability, she might get some sort of freedom in her judgemental and degrading workplace. However, when Vanya, a 21-year-old son of a wealthy oligarch with enough money to live carelessly for the rest of his life, invites Ani to come to his New Year’s Eve party, it feels as if this improbable dream may come true.
This is the first stage of winter; it feels like this could be Ani’s get-out-of-jail-free card, her ticket to a better life. It is played as a Cinderella story, with Baker showing the contrast between her cramped shared apartment, neighbor to the loud New York Subway, and Vanya’s hollow but outlandishly large mansion. Vanya asks Ani to stay the week, and as their love grows, they head to Vegas and get married, where “Greatest Day” plays once more, but this time it is not a hope, but rather, a reality.
However, their blossoming romance crumbles when Vanya’s parents find out about his new wife, they send out three of their men to get the marriage annulled. Thus, just a few weeks after the euphoric New Year, the winter joy comes crashing down, and suddenly, Ani’s world becomes cold and frosty. Vanya flees the house to escape the consequences of his actions.
In the aftermath of the midpoint turn, the film’s vibrancy is lost, and New York becomes empty, barren, and isolated. As Ani and the three stooges walk down the promenade and theme park of Brighton Beach, it feels far from the idyllic utopia she had been living in just a few hours earlier. Baker drops the pacing from the breakneck opening act right down with an almost aching anxiety to the uncertainty of what entails in Ani’s future. Baker shows the four characters walking alone, with significant gaps between them. There is a lot of space at the top of the frame, adding to its emptiness. Likewise, the pale winter sky is unconsuming, not filling up the area Baker affords but rather leaving it bare. The only dominant color is the hue of a red scarf, which Ani was gagged with earlier in the film. It is a New York far away from the hustle and bustle energy one would expect from the Big Apple, presenting Ani’s world tumbling down, and whereas Vanya and his comrades can escape in one the wintery tundra by private jet, there is no such fortune for the tenacious, persistent but hapless Ani, who has little to no agency throughout the film.
The film’s final scene is one last turn of Baker using winter to swing the narrative. It follows Ani’s migration from Vanya’s expansive mansion back to her apartment and the mundanity of residential New York, where the only things that tower over the character’s heads are the overbearing subway system, itself a transportation to a better life in the wealthier areas of New York. She is dropped off by Igor and taken back to her apartment. Waiting in the car during a long pause, it is as if she doesn’t want to let this dreamy fantasy go. As she finally decides to leave, Igor summons her, and Ani looks concerned. Igor gives her back her ring, but Ani is unsure what to do. Is it an opportunity to sell it and have greater economic prosperity, or is it a reminder of the struggle she has been through or the good times she had with Vanya?
As Igor returns, Ani remains confused before choosing to get on top of Igor and ride him. Is this an act of taking agency, returning to her past life, or simply attempting to satisfy Igor? It is unclear. She breaks down, clutching Igor, completely broken by her experience throughout the film. The car is now engulfed in snow; they are hidden from the world that surrounds them, they are alone, and it feels like, for once, Ani can let her shield down. She does not have to remain strong and defiant but can finally admit how she is feeling. She is barren, bare, naked, like the trees of winter. As Baker cuts to black and the credits, the sound of the windscreen wipers continues, and the wintery atmosphere continues into the credits.
Winter is the key to unlocking all the layers of Sean Baker’s “Anora.” The film does not work without its wintery setting. It is this frosty, icy setting that keeps it in dialogue with the films of 2024. The film’s opening has a winter warmth, representing an idyllic American Dream fantasy, a moment of breaking the class structure. However, after the film’s major turn, winter becomes cold and isolating, and the American dream is a lie, losing faith and trust in that dream. Throughout this section, she is discriminated against because of her occupation. In the final scene, a moment where the winter snow is concealed allows Ani to try and take her agency back while exposing her true feelings and emotions. For these reasons, winter is a way to place “Anora” in the cultural zeitgeist of 2024 cinema, one of, if not the film that defines the films of 2024.
How many Oscars do you believe “Anora” will win on March 2nd? What do you think of this theme of winer throughout Baker’s storytelling in the film? Please let us know on on Next Best Picture’s X account and check out Next Best Picture’s latest Oscar predictions here.
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