Film Review Double Feature: "Moana 2" and "Anora"
Though very different, both the Disney film and the Neon awards darling are about journeys and how difficult, perilous, and at times rewarding such odysseys can be.
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Warning: Full spoilers for the films follow.
For today’s movie review I’m doing a bit of an unorthodox double feature: Moana 2 and Anora. Superficially, of course, these films have almost nothing in common–one’s about a young Polynesian woman who sets out an extraordinary adventure to save her people from eventual extinction, while the other is about a New York City stripper who ends up getting married to the son of a Russian oligarch only for a madcap (and tragic) adventure to ensue. At the same time, as these brief summaries make clear, they’re both films about the enduring narrative power of the hero’s journey narrative, even if they end up in very different emotional spaces.
I must admit that I was very skeptical about Moana 2 as a project, particularly given the fact that it started life as a TV project for Disney+ before being revamped as a feature film. And, I’m sad to say, my concerns were valid, for while the film is enjoyable and entertaining and has a laudable message, it’s also very uneven when it comes to its songs, visuals, and story. You know, all of the things that typically go into a Disney movie.
It’s shaky from the beginning, since it sort of throws us into the middle of things, with Moana exploring islands near her home in the hope of finding others. Her efforts take on a new urgency when she is visited by her ancestor who warns her that she needs to find the island of Motufetu in order to bring the sundered people of the world back together or else her own people will perish. It’s an intriguing premise, but one that could have done with a bit more narrative explanation.
Indeed,the film as a whole never quite outruns some of the gaping holes in its own story, for all that it tries to suture them together with songs and the usual kinetic energy that we expect from a Disney feature. All of this can only go so far, though, and a number of puzzling enigmas remain, and I couldn’t help but wonder whether the expanded scope of a TV series would have better suited the story. As it is, phenomena seem to exist solely for the purpose of moving the plot along, and while this won’t distract younger viewers, I found myself constantly puzzled by the gaps in the story’s own internal logic.
Visually the film is beautiful, though I don’t think it ever attains quite the sublime reaches of the original. The closest it comes to this is when Moana and company approach Nalo and the sunken island of Motufetu, and there’s something exhilarating and terrifying about the storms that the god commands, in all of their violet-hued glory and violence. I frequently found myself wishing that we had more of this kind of vibrant palette in the rest of it.
Likewise, I found the music to be fine but utterly forgettable. Even though I just saw the film yesterday, I literally couldn’t tell you a single song or hum a single bar. I often found myself wishing for Lin-Manuel Miranda’s return and his undeniable ear for a catchy number.
Where Moana really succeeds, though, is in its two leads, and both Auliʻi Cravalho and Dwayne Johnson excel at their roles. The film really only finds its groove once the two finally reunite, and one can’t help but wish that the screenplay had brought them together earlier rather than have Maui spend almost half of the film captured by the being known as Matangi. Their banter and their undeniable bond forms the spine of the film, and they always outshine the other, newer members of the ensemble.
Speaking of Matangi…this was one character who definitely needed more screen time. For one thing, we never really get much insight into her motivations, other than that she seems to be some sort of underling for Nalo and has thus been tasked with keeping Maui prisoner. She is, though, a simply delightful character of the sort that Disney used to excel at creating, slinking and slithering around with her horde of bats. It’s almost as if she teleported in from one of the films of the Renaissance, complete with one of the few songs that make much of an impression.
That being said, however, I do think that the ethos of the film as a whole is one that feels very refreshing, particularly in our fraught political moment, in which isolationism and tribalism threaten to undo us all. While I don’t think that every film has to have a “message” that it wants to convey, I do think that it’s nice to see another escapist film engage with real-world concerns, even if obliquely.
Given that the film ends with a bit of a cliffhanger–showing a fateful meeting between Mantangi, Nalo, and Tamatoa, the giant crab from the first film, in which they plot against Moana–it seems a fair bet that we’re going to get a third installment of this series. Though I’m not opposed to theatrical sequels per se, it really does seem that Disney is leaving behind an era of original stories in order to continue mining its existing IP. It must seem like a sound business decision in the short time, but I can’t help but wonder whether such a lack of original stories won’t eventually bankrupt the studio, if not financially then certainly creatively.
Anora is about as different from Moana 2 as it is possible to be. Directed by Sean Baker–whose 2015 film Tangerine I absolutely adored–the film centers on young New York City stripper Anora (Mikey Madison) whose life is unexpectedly turned upside down once she begins a whirlwind romance with Vanya (Mark Eydelshteyn), the son of a Russian oligarch. Upon their impromptu marriage things go more than a little off the rails when his parents dispatch their cronies to make sure the marriage is annulled. Chaos, hilarity, and tragedy ensue.
As with Tangerine, Anora is a very funny movie, often bitingly so. This is particularly true once Toros (frequent Baker collaborator Karren Karagulian) appears and tries to get Vanya in hand and to convince Anora to agree to an annulment. After Vanya flees–after a very humorous scuffle with two of Toros’ henchmen–Anora is dragged along on a bit of a madcap series of escapades across New York City. There were many moments where I literally laughed out loud.
Much of the humor stems both from Karagulian’s ability to capture a certain earnest befuddlement and from Madison’s undeniable motor mouth. She has a particularly antagonistic relationship with henchman Igor (Yura Burisov), but it’s one that has more than a little humor and fondness in it. Even though their initial meeting involves him trying to keep her captive he, at least, seems to see her as an actual person rather than a
Yet for all that she has the brash working-class attitude one would expect from a New York City stripper, there’s also a remarkable sensitivity and depth to Anora, one that Madison adeptly captures. For all that her liaison with Vanya begins as a strictly financial arrangement, one gets the sense that she also sees in him an escape from the rather dreary life that she typically leads, characterized as it is by tending to the groping hands of patrons and coworkers who hate her as jovially as she does them. It’s not that she’s actually looking to be rescued, mind, it’s just that she’s not going to turn away an opportunity when it comes knocking, particularly when the savior just happens to be cute, twinky, and relentlessly hedonistic Vanya.
Even though he disappears for a significant chunk of the second half of the film, Eydelshteyn is quite charming and charismatic as the pampered son of a powerful oligarch. He’s the type of young man who talks a big game when his parents are away but, when push comes to shove, he’s more than willing to go home with his tail between his legs, leaving Anora behind to pick up the pieces of her life. For all of his talk of love and genuine affection for her, the truth is that she’s just another trinket, another way he can tweak his parents and their efforts to control his life. He’s as thoughtless about her well-being as he is his many supposed friends.
And then there’s the ending, in which Anora tries to reward Igor’s kindness to her with sex only to break down into heaving sobs, before the screen fades to black. Given that much of Anora feels like a black screwball comedy–I kept thinking not only of Baker’s earlier work but also of the Coen Brothers while I was watching it–this breakdown might seem like a strange way to end the film. Yet we’ve seen signs of Anora’s inner pain repeatedly throughout the film. While there’s certainly something mercenary about her decision to marry Vanya, one gets the sense that she does develop some genuine feelings for him and that she is both hurt and humiliated by the fact that he clearly never felt anything for her but instead saw her as disposable, not even worth a decent or coherent explanation as to his actions.
With this in mind, it’s easy to see why she would break down in the arms of a man she hardly knows but who has been one of the few to show her any genuine kindness. For a woman like Anora–someone who feigns attraction and a pleasant demeanor for a living and who is rewarded based on how well she can perform–this bit of compassion from Igor seems to undo her completely. We don’t know what’s in store for Anora going forward, but we can surely hope that she manages to claw a little bit of happiness for herself, whether with Igor or someone else or maybe, just maybe, by herself.
In their own ways, both Moana 2 and Anora are about going on journeys, experiencing emotional tumult and, at the end of the day, coming home to find that nothing can ever be the same.