Hit the ATM? How about hitting the jackpot? “Anora” has won the Oscar for Best Picture at the 2025 Academy Awards, capping off a remarkable awards season run that began with the Sean Baker film starring Mikey Madison winning the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival last May. It’s only the fourth film ever to win Best Picture at the Oscars after winning the Palme, following “The Lost Weekend,” “Marty,” and “Parasite.” And IndieWire has celebrated “Anora” since it premiered at Cannes, through our Future of Filmmaking Summit, where Baker was our keynote speaker, to Oscar night itself.
“Anora” finished the night with five Oscar wins: Best Picture, Best Actress Mikey Madison, Best Editing, Best Original Screenplay, and Best Director. Of these, Baker personally won four, as the film’s director, producer, editor, and screenwriter.
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Producer Alex Coco said when accepting his Best Picture Oscar, “If you’re trying to make independent films, please keep doing it. We need more. This is proof.”
Producer Samantha Quan thanked “Our small but mighty crew and our ridiculously talented cast led by the amazing Mikey Madison. We made this on very little money, so all of our hearts go to all of the dreamers and the young filmmakers out there. Tell the stories you want to tell. Tell the stories that move you. I promise you you will never regret it.”
And director, producer, screenwriter, and editor Sean Baker said, capping off his four-Oscar haul, “One last thing, I want to thank the Academy for recognizing a truly independent film. This film was made on the blood, sweat, and tears of incredible indie artists, and long lived independent film!”
“Anora” follows a sex worker, played by Madison, who embarks on a whirlwind marriage to a Russian oligarch’s son (Mark Eydelshteyn) after he pays her $15,000 to be his “horny girlfriend” for the weekend. Baker’s focused on sex work several times throughout this career, in previous movies such as “Starlet,” “The Florida Project,” and “Red Rocket” and the filmmaker became specifically interested in the Russian-American milieu of New York City’s Brighton Beach neighborhood when he worked as a wedding videography in the early 2000s. Sometimes, those videos were for Russian Orthodox weddings.
Winning Best Picture is the culmination of an awards season that’s seen “Anora” win Best Picture at the Independent Spirit Awards, Critics’ Choice Awards, and the Los Angeles Film Critics Association. “Anora” was nominated for six Academy Awards overall: In addition to Best Picture, it was nominated for Best Actress Mikey Madison, Best Supporting Actor Yura Borisov, Best Director Sean Baker, and Best Original Screenplay and Best Film Editing (both of which were for Baker himself).
IndieWire has been a champion of “Anora” from the start. Our Chief Film Critic David Ehrlich gave it an “A” review at Cannes. Then we invited Sean Baker to give the keynote chat at our Future of Filmmaking Summit in Los Angeles in November 2024.
He used that keynote chat to emphasize a point that he’s made throughout the entirety of the “Anora” journey since Cannes: That there’s nothing that can replace theatrical exhibition for both filmmakers and audiences.
“It’s been forever since we said the death of cinema is here, but I really do feel that right now, it is at its greatest threat of, unfortunately, the way we know it, dying because of a lot of things that have happened over the last five years,” Baker said at the Future of Filmmaking Summit. “Audience habits have changed because of COVID, because of streaming, we’re losing our theaters daily. The theatrical experience — seeing a movie in a theater with a crowd, with an audience — you can’t get that experience watching it at home no matter how good your system, no matter what 4K, 6K, 80-inch television you have set up. It’s not the same, it’s not that communal experience. I think we’re losing that, and so it’s gonna take everybody to battle against it.”
Since then, Baker continued to use the awards campaign for “Anora” to signal support for filmmakers and comment on the film industry’s health, including just last week when he won Best Director at the Spirit Awards.
“We are creating product that creates jobs and revenue for the entire industry. We shouldn’t be barely getting by,” he said. “Creatives that are involved with projects that span years have to begin getting higher — much higher — upfront fees, and again, because back end simply can’t be relied upon any longer, we have to demand that. If not, indie films will simply become calling card films, and I know that’s not what I signed up for.”
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