One of the wilder Oscar seasons in recent memory — one jolted, to an unknowable extent, by wildfires that devastated Los Angeles in early January, followed by a massive post-nominations scandal that imploded a top contender in late January — came to an end on Sunday night with Neon’s Anora, a $6 million indie about a Brighton Beach sex worker who gets abducted by Russians, winning a field-leading five Oscars: best picture (Sean Baker, Alex Coco and Samantha Quan), director (Baker), actress (Mikey Madison), original screenplay (Baker) and film editing (Baker).
How did this happen?
Anora’s journey began at May’s Cannes Film Festival, where the main competition jury, presided over by Greta Gerwig, awarded the dramedy that fest’s highest honor, the Palme d’Or. The Palme is not always a guarantee of Oscar success — indeed, only two prior films, 1955’s Marty and 2019’s Neon-distributed Parasite, had ever won the Palme and then been able to sustain enough momentum to win the best picture Oscar some nine months later. But in the case of Anora, it caused the industry to take seriously a film starring a cast of actors and actresses that few had ever heard of, guided by a filmmaker who has long been widely admired and respected in cineaste circles, but whose prior seven features had collectively received only a single Oscar nomination (best supporting actor for The Florida Project’s Willem Dafoe).
From there, Neon — perhaps realizing that in Anora, it once again had a solidly-made and highly-entertaining film that is arguably, at its core, about economic inequality and desperation — largely redeployed its Parasite playbook. It re-launched the film at the fall film fests (Telluride, Toronto and New York), with its filmmaker on hand to help introduce its stars to the film community. It then did the de rigueur screenings, Q&As and receptions, en route to a mid-October platform release (Parasite debuted on Oct. 11 on a single screen, Anora began its rollout on Oct. 18 in six locations). And it let the strong buzz and amazing reviews (Anora is at 93 percent on Rotten Tomatoes) provide the wind behind its sails the rest of the way (it has thus far grossed just under $41 million worldwide, nearly seven times its cost).
This season’s Oscar nominations were announced just over five weeks ago, on Jan. 23. Five films garnered more noms than Anora’s tally of six: Netflix’s Emilia Pérez with 13; A24’s The Brutalist and Universal’s Wicked with 10 each; and Searchlight’s A Complete Unknown and Focus’ Conclave with eight each. Best picture was generally regarded as a six-horse race between those titles, with a slight edge to Emilia Pérez; no one was picking Anora to win. But less than a week later, the Emilia Pérez campaign was shattered by the dissemination of hateful tweets from the actress who played the film’s title character, and subsequent interviews and statements that she gave that made the situation even worse.
Then came a 48-hour period three weekends ago — between Friday, Feb. 7, and Sunday, Feb. 9, just ahead of the window of final Oscars voting spanning Feb. 11 through Feb. 18 — during which Anora decisively seized the pole position. On Feb. 7, it was awarded the best picture Critics Choice Award (voting for which closed before the Emilia Pérez chaos), and on Feb. 9 it snagged the top prizes at both the Producers Guild Awards (voting for which slightly overlapped with it) and at the Directors Guild Awards (voting for which was open well after it). Anora backers subsequently got a bit of a scare when Conclave won the best film BAFTA Award (Feb. 16) and the best ensemble SAG Award (Feb. 23). But by that time, the cake was already baked.
Funnily enough, Baker, a lovely, understated, genuinely humble guy, seemed to know the score before any of the rest of us did. I remember chatting with him and Madison in early October, before heading out to moderate a Q&A with them in front of an audience at UTA, about the other films that had recently begun rolling out at the recent fall fests, when Baker let slip something to the effect of, “The Brutalist sounds like it’s our main competition.” At the time, I must confess, I thought several films might actually have a better shot than Anora, but I kept that sentiment to myself.
My fellow pundits and I were too slow to realize all of the ways that the post-#OscarsSoWhite (2015 and 2016) transformation of the Academy had changed the game. Most of our focus in recent years has been on race and gender (the Academy doubled its number of non-white members and non-male members), but it turns out that geography and age may have had even more of an effect on voting. The huge increase in members based outside the U.S. seems to have created a greater openness to non-English-language films, as we saw with Parasite. And that, coupled with an influx of younger members, most of whom work outside of the U.S. studio system, severely undercut long-held biases about the definition of an “Oscar movie.”
Indeed, in the years since #OscarsSoWhite, best picture winners — chosen using a preferential ballot that ostensibly rewards consensus — have included Moonlight, The Shape of Water, Parasite, Everything Everywhere All at Once and now Anora, all quirky, eccentric, non-formulaic art-house movies that never would have won with the old Academy. Something else those films share in common: the directors of each are all filmmakers’ filmmakers — only 10 years ago, Baker shot an entire feature film, Tangerine, using iPhones — who are passionate and outspoken champions of cinema. This seems to matter more than it used to.
Anora’s popularity was, to a large extent, propelled by breakout Madison, and, in turn, propelled her to a far-from-assured win in a tremendously competitive best actress race. While the 25-year-old had won BAFTA and Spirit awards over 62-year-old Demi Moore of The Substance, Moore had won Golden Globe, Critics Choice and SAG awards over Madison, and was the favorite to win the Oscar as well.
I should have stuck with my second-to-last forecast, on Feb. 17, in which I had Madison winning. After all, if Oscar voters loved Anora, as many clearly did, then why wouldn’t they love Anora herself? But I ultimately suspected that they would break for the overdue veteran — even if her movie was polarizing — over the newcomer who will surely have more chances, as they did recently in awarding best actor to Brendan Fraser over Austin Butler. Alas, they did not. I must confess that, while feeling happy for Madison, I feel sorry for Moore, who has now experienced in real-life something not unlike what her character experiences in her movie, in terms of the industry elbowing her aside for a younger alternative. It’s a rough business.
The other acting races were won by the favorites.
22 years after winning best actor for The Pianist, Adrien Brody won it again for another tour de force portrayal of a Holocaust survivor, in The Brutalist. In so doing, he became just the 11th person to have won that award more than once, joining a pretty elite club. The other members: Daniel Day-Lewis (the only three-time winner), Jack Nicholson, Spencer Tracy, Marlon Brando, Dustin Hoffman, Tom Hanks, Anthony Hopkins, Fredric March, Gary Cooper and Sean Penn. For a guy whose career had floundered in the years since The Pianist, to the extent that he temporarily quit the business, this is a remarkable comeback story. (To be sure, A Complete Unknown’s Timothée Chalamet will have more chances; I hope the same is true for Conclave’s Ralph Fiennes.)
A Real Pain’s Kieran Culkin and Emilia Pérez’s Zoe Saldaña had won best supporting actor and best supporting actress, respectively, all season long, and were not derailed at the Oscars by the fact that the former’s film was not nominated for best picture and the latter’s was wounded by the tweets scandal. Indeed, of its 13 noms, Emilia Pérez’s only other Oscar win was best original song for “El Mal.” It was derailed in the best international feature category by Brazil’s I’m Still Here, which had lost to Emilia Pérez at the Golden Globe, Critics Choice and BAFTA awards, but was gaining interest and momentum (on the heels of its surprise best picture Oscar nom) just as Emilia Pérez was losing it.
Netflix, which came into the ceremony with more noms than any other company, 18, left with three wins: the two for Emilia Pérez, plus best documentary short for The Only Girl in the Orchestra. Neon, which came into the ceremony with seven noms, left with five wins, more than any other company. Close behind was A24, which rode The Brutalist to three wins (best actor, cinematography and original score). Winning two each were Universal (best costume design and production design for Wicked) and Warner Bros. (best sound and visual effects for Dune: Part Two). And taking home one each: Searchlight (best supporting actor for A Real Pain), Focus (best adapted screenplay for Conclave), MUBI (best makeup/hairstyling for The Substance) and Sideshow/Janus (best animated feature for Flow).
Three other winners are still seeking U.S. distribution: best documentary feature No Other Land, a collaboration between Palestinian and Israeli filmmakers about life in the West Bank (which prevailed in what I suspect was a close contest with Porcelain War, a film about Ukrainian artists affected by the Russian invasion); best animated short In the Shadow of the Cypress; and best live action short I’m Not a Robot.
Thus ends another Oscar season. My thanks to all of the artists who worked on the beautiful and provocative films that I watched and covered, and who joined me on my Awards Chatter podcast (including Madison, Brody and Saldaña); to all of the publicists who helped me to see films and book talent; to my THR editors and colleagues, with whom I am privileged to consult and collaborate every day; and to all of you, who read, watch and listen to the content that I put out. I am very grateful.
And now… on to the Emmys season!
