erikstuborn

A repeat of the truth-lie scheme already seen in the first episode. It loses credibility at times. Especially after a brilliant second episode, a tribute (whatever anyone says) to Buster Keaton's slapstick comedy. The frenetic urge to lie and look good in front of someone else only lasts for one episode. If the pattern repeats itself, as I am doing right now, I think The Studio is going to lose a viewer, although after all the Emmys, I suppose that will be a source of laughter for them.

It's a shame that an artist like Sean Baker, who has devoted much of his work to dignifying and giving visibility to sex workers (in his previous films 'Starlet' and 'Red Rocket', for example), has chosen such a hackneyed and predictable story for his big-budget film.

One of the interesting things about Baker's work was his ability to create unresolved tension; the sense of permanent unease that his characters lived with (always walking a tightrope) was what gave his films their value and power.

In Anora, everything seems easy, until, predictably, it stops being so. First surprise for a Baker film: you see the disaster coming. It doesn't take you by surprise. Then pandemonium breaks out (with more than twenty minutes of the film in which everyone screams), unbearable in a way that any other director (Guy Ritchie, for example) would have resolved in three minutes with two well-aimed punches.

That means it's a film that isn't 'serious', that the thugs aren't serious, the oligarchs aren't serious, the sex workers aren't serious. It's all frivolous and banal, therefore implausible and dispensable.

I think you should go back to low-budget cinema and revisit your lumpen characters, where you found your narrative style and inspiration. This world of rich people isn't for you, Sean.

Compared to his first two (and important) films, 'Mr & Mme Adelman' and 'La belle époque', this one falls far short in terms of wit and depth. It develops situations and characters that could be interesting at first glance but end up flat and unconvincing in the final cut.

Marine Vacth, who is gorgeous, plays a character who is adrift, unable to make the right decisions in a world to which she does not belong. Pierre Niney plays a character with no particular charms or skills, which makes the attention he attracts from women seem implausible. Adjani builds a character knowing that what she is presenting is herself as an outdated figure at the end of a glorious career, and she does so magnificently.

The well-constructed set and the camera movements, which are so accurate and restrained that they are barely noticeable, immerse us in the world of wealth and glamour of the French Riviera.

The other actors perform with dignity and style, demonstrating director Nicolas Bedos' ability to handle actors.

However, the script, treated as a flashback with a subgenre of courtroom drama in the background, confuses and blurs the main story, which would be simple and easy to tell if this back-and-forth technique had not been used. This is probably more of an editing error than a script error, and I think it has cost the film better ratings.