Everything the Anora director has said to explain the meaning behind its heartbreaking ending

I was braced for greatness when I went to see Anora. Knowing it was a Sean Baker film, knowing it starred Mikey Madison and knowing it won the Palme D’Or at Cannes – hype was real. And the amazing thing about Anora is it truly lives up to every bit of hype you might muster for it. It works as a perfect romcom, it works as a farcical chase with bumbling goons and it works as a devastating gut punch. What a film. The ending to Anora is complex and open to interpretation – so here’s the gist of it explained and everything Sean Baker has said about what it all means to him as a director.

What is Anora all about?

Anora stars Mikey Madison as the titular character, an exotic dancer in New Jersey who becomes the fixation of a rich Russian oligarch’s son named Ivan. Ivan starts to pay for sex from Anora, and as the two grow fonder he pays her to be his girlfriend for a week and the two then get married in a whirlwind Vegas wedding.

After Ivan’s family find out about this, they furiously send some goons (including Igor) to force Anora and Ivan to annul the marriage – which turns into a load of chaos as the bunch hunt for Ivan who legs it in order to not get sent back home to Russia and carry on his American debauchery.

The heartbreaking realisation that Anora has been duped by Ivan who is just essentially a spoilt brat makes the second half of the film increasingly more sad. Eventually, Ivan’s parents come over from Russia and are suitably horrid – and Anora is embarrassed and gutted by the turn of events.

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As Igor takes her back from Vegas to New Jersey, the two chat together and seem to have some tension. When Igor drops Anora back at her home, the two start to have sex in his car – but when he goes to kiss her she freaks out and then bursts into tears as the screen cuts to black. What does it all mean?

Baker purposely left the ending ambiguous – but the complex emotions Anora goes through reflect how she has not just gone through pure emotional turmoil over the course of the film, but also her relationship with intimacy and men being close to her in non-transactional ways.

Sean Baker said “It was so great to have Mikey, Mark, and Yura really get into the development of their characters and understand why things are happening. We’re dealing with some complex relationships, especially at the end with Ani’s gravitation towards Igor. That stuff was discussed a lot, like what’s going on in Ani’s head in that ending scene? It was great to have actors who were so invested because they wanted to discuss this.”

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