‘Anora’, a strip club Cinderella story without the fairy tale ending, was crowned ‘Best Picture’ at the 97th Academy Awards on Sunday, handing Sean Baker’s gritty, Brooklyn-set screwball farce Hollywood’s top prize.
In a stubbornly fluctuating Oscar season, ‘Anora’, the Palme d'Or-winner at the Cannes Film Festival, emerged as the unlikely frontrunner. Baker’s tale of an erotic dancer who elopes with the son of a Russian oligarch - unusually explicit for a best-picture winner - was made for just 6 million dollars.
But Oscar voters, eschewing blockbuster contenders like ‘Wicked’ and ‘Dune: Part Two’, instead added ‘Anora’ to a string of recent indie best picture winners, including ‘Everything Everywhere All at Once’, ‘CODA’ and ‘Nomadland’.
For a film industry transformed by streaming and humbled by economic turmoil, Baker and Anora epitomised cinematic purity. On the campaign trail, Baker called for the return to the 90-day exclusive theatrical release.
“Where did we fall in love with the movies? At the movie theater. Filmmakers, keep making films for the big screen,” Baker said.
In personally winning four Oscars on Sunday, Baker tied the mark held by Walt Disney, who won for four different films in 1954. That Baker and Disney share the record is ironic; his ‘The Florida Project’ took place in a Florida low-budget motel in the shadow of Disneyland.
“Long live independent film!” shouted Baker from the Dolby Theatre stage.
22 years after winning best actor for ‘The Pianist’, Adrien Brody won the same Oscar again for his performance as another Holocaust survivor in Brady Corbet’s ‘The Brutalist’. Brody’s win came over Timothée Chalamet (‘A Complete Unknown’), who had the chance of becoming the youngest best actor ever, a record owned by Brody - just short of 30 when he won for ‘The Pianist’.
“I’m here once again to represent the lingering traumas and the repercussions of war and systematic oppression and of antisemitism and racism and othering. I pray for a healthier, happier and more inclusive world. If the past can teach us anything it’s not to let hate go unchecked,” said Brody.
Mikey Madison won the ‘Best Actress’ award for her breakthrough performance in ‘Anora’, a victory that came over the category favourite, Demi Moore (‘The Substance’).
Sean Baker, the filmmaker of ‘Anora’, won ‘Best Director’, ‘Best Original Screenplay’ and ‘Best Editing’ awards. Baker used his acceptance speech for best director to preach passionately about the theatrical experience.
“Where did we fall in love with the movies? At the movie theater. Filmmakers, keep making films for the big screen. I want to thank the sex worker community. They have shared their stories. They have shared life experiences with me over the years. My deepest respect. Thank you. I share this with you,” said Baker, echoing comments he made when ‘Anora’ won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.
The Oscars otherwise spread the love around, dishing out awards to ‘Anora’, ‘Conclave’, ‘Wicked’ and ‘The Substance’. Eight of the 10 movies nominated for ‘Best Picture’ came away with at least one award at the Dolby Theatre on Sunday. That included the beleaguered ‘Netflix’ contender ‘Emilia Pérez’, which, despite a backlash to old offensive tweets by star Karla Sofía Gascón, won ‘Best Supporting Actress’ honour for Zoe Saldaña.
“I am a proud child of immigrant parents with dreams and dignity and hard-working hands. I am the first American of Dominican origin to accept an Academy Award and I know I will not be the last,” said Saldaña.
The night’s first award, presented by Robert Downey Jr., went to Kieran Culkin for ‘Best Supporting Actor’. Culkin has cruised through the season, picking up award after award, for his performance alongside Jesse Eisenberg in ‘A Real Pain’.
“I have no idea how I got here. I’ve just been acting my whole life,” said Culkin.
Culkin spent most of his speech recalling an earlier, hypothetical promise from his wife Jazz Charton, that they could have a fourth child if he won an Oscar. Culkin used the opportunity to take Charton - ‘love of my life, ye of little faith’ - up on the offer.
The biggest upset early on came in the best-animated feature category - ‘Flow’, the wordless Latvian film upset DreamWorks Animations’ ‘The Wild Robot’. The win for ‘Flow’, an ecological parable about a cat in a flooded world, was the first Oscar ever for a Latvian film.
“Thank you to my cats and dogs,” director Gints Zilbalodis said while accepting the award.
‘Wicked’ stars Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo kicked off the ceremony with a tribute to Los Angeles following the wildfires that devastated the Southern California metropolis earlier this year. Grande sang ‘Somewhere Over the Rainbow’ and Erivo performed Diana Ross’ ‘Home’ before the ‘Wicked’ stars joined together for ‘Defying Gravity’ from their blockbuster big-screen musical.
Later, ‘Wicked’, the biggest box-office hit among the best-picture nominees, won awards for production design and costume design.
“I’m the first Black man to receive the costume design award,” said costume designer Paul Tazewell, who couldn’t finish that sentence before the crowd began to rise in a standing ovation. “I’m so proud of this.”
Best makeup and hairstyling went to ‘The Substance’ for its gory creations of beauty and body horror. ‘Dune: Part Two’ won for both visual effects and sound and its sandworm - arguably the star of the night - figured into multiple gags throughout the evening.
Brady Corbet’s sprawling postwar epic ‘The Brutalist’, shot in ‘VistaVision’, won for its cinematography, by Lol Crawley and its score, by Daniel Blumberg.