From 'Anora' to 'The Substance,' tales of beauty and its price galvanize Cannes
After the competition lineup at the Cannes Film Festival got a lackluster start last week, the festival was enlivened by a string of films both fleshy and carnal
CANNES, France (AP) — “Beauty is like war,” says Gary Oldman, in character, in Paolo Sorrentino’s “Parthenope.” “It opens doors.”
“Parthenope,” in which Oldman plays the author John Cheever, premiered Tuesday in Cannes. It's just one of the films at this year’s festival to consider beauty: its disruptive power, its cost and the sometimes dangerous portals it might pry ajar. After the competition lineup — the films vying for the Palme d’Or — got a lackluster start last week, Cannes was enlivened by a string of films both fleshy and carnal.
Foremost among them was Sean Baker’s “Anora,” in which Mikey Madison stars as a 23-year-old Russian American stripper in Brighton Beach-Coney Island section of Brooklyn. Baker, the director of “The Florida Project” and “Red Rocket,” has a keen eye for the way social stratification seeps into even the most intimate relationships of his protagonists.
“There’s a million stories to be told in the world of sex workers,” Baker told reporters Wednesday in Cannes. “It’s a livelihood, it’s a career, it’s a job and it’s one that should be respected. In my opinion, it should be decriminalized and not in any way regulated because it is a sex worker’s body and it is up to them to decide how they will use it in their livelihood.”
