The young actress Mikey Madison who played Anora was terrifically believable. I have read a few descriptions of this movie that call it a “comedy,” but in my opinion that description diminishes the pathos of this story. This is a story about a woman who gets swept up in the reckless adventure of a careless spoiled man then tossed aside. True to character, this tough little survivor doesn’t go gentle into the night. When she realizes she has been used, her sadness is profoundly universal. Who hasn’t experienced the trauma of thinking someone loved her only to find out that the shared experience, whatever it was, was not love. Mikey Madison’s performance as an exotic (lap)dancer was close up and unflinching compared to Julia Roberts’ air brushed Cinderella in Pretty Woman. Anora was both touchingly naive and brutally pragmatic, while Ivan with his easy good looks was unnervingly credible as a selfish brat. His silly giggle made me nervous because I’ve heard it before (in older men, it would translate into cruel evasion and dismissal). In the end, I wanted Anora to triumph. I’m not sure she did but I can’t stop thinking about her.
