Who is the director “anora” Sean Baker? Films, Oscars, career, what to know

• On Sunday, the director of “Anora” marked history at the Oscars.
• He won each of his four nominations, including the biggest prix of the evening, the best film.
• The independent filmmaker has already told Bi that he was not trying to make his films more pleasant to the studios.

If you did not know the name of Sean Baker before Sunday evening, you certainly do it now.

The director marked the story at the 97th Academy Awards on Sunday, becoming the first filmmaker to win four Oscars in one night for the same film. (Walt Disney won four Oscars in 1953, but for four separate films; Bong Joon Ho won four in 2020 for “Parasite”, but one was for the best international feature film, which is technically awarded to the country, not the filmmaker.)

“Anora”, a dramatic on a young stripper that impulsively marries the son of a Russian oligarch, baker statues hanging for the best director, the best original scenario, the best editing and the best film. The film’s advance, Mikey Madison, also won a surprise victory, beating the favorite Demi Moore in the category of best actress.

Although Baker has been relatively unknown to the general public so far, the independent filmmaker has not come out of nowhere. I spoke to Baker in October, months before “Anora” sweeps away the Oscars, his work and the state of film creation.

Sean Baker’s films are acclaimed by criticism, but have been widely ignored by the main award organizations before “Anora”

After graduating from the New York University film program in 1998, the Baker born in New Jersey quickly found its niche by focusing on marginalized communities. Half of his features, including “anora”, specifically concern sex (the) sex.

But making your work more pleasant and marketable to a wider audience has never been on the agenda.

“I always turned in my foot. I was always doing something that would make my film probably not accessible to the dominant current,” said Baker, quoting his inclusion of a sex scene not simulated in “Starlet” of 2012, a film on porn stars, as an example.

Before “Anora”, Baker’s most successful film in terms of recognition of the awards was “The Florida Project”, his drama of 2017 life on a 6 -year -old girl and her single mother who lives a life -long unemployment in Kissimmee, Florida, just outside Walt Disney World. As with “Anora” and most of his films, Baker has drawn a quadruple duty, realizing, writing, production and edition.

Although largely considered to be Baker’s best work to date, apart from the awards of criticism organizations, Baker has not obtained statuettes – only the star Willem Dafoe won an Oscar nomination for her support role as a motel owner.

Given his history by stealing under the radar, Baker told Bi last fall that he had been amazed that “Anora” had disrupted consumer public.

“I thought it was going to be extremely conflicting, very honestly,” he said.

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Baker is a free supporter of the independent film and theatrical releases

Baker gave four speeches to the Oscars, thanking his team, his cast, the distributor of the film Neon, his producer colleagues (including his wife, Samantha Quan), and the sex workers who have opened their world over the years. He also took the opportunity during his best director victory to zoom and give a passionate call to support the theatrical experience.

“”Watch a movie in the theater With an audience is an experience. We can laugh together, cry together and, at a time when the world can feel very divided, it is more important than ever, “said Baker, adding that experience is” threatened ” With theaters, in particular independent property, closure at unprecedented rates.

“If we do not revers this trend, we will lose a vital part of our culture,” he said.

In the middle of the still insufficient theatrical outing windows, Baker implored the filmmakers to continue making films with the big screen experience in mind and asked the distributors to focus on theatrical versions.

This is something he also addressed during his victories to directors and producers Guild Awards in February, where he asked his colleagues filmmakers to demand 90 -day windows for their films to play in theaters. (Indiewire reported that in 2024, the average theatrical window was only 32 days in 85 wide films, spending more than 13% compared to the previous year.)

Baker has openly criticized the tendency opposed to the risk of Hollywood to bet on superproductions and films based on IP on original dramas. This criticism did not always go well, because when Baker told the Associated Press last year that he had missed “mature films for adults” which had no explosions or superheroes or gender films.

Some have taken his complaint to be a search in superhero films and horror films. Baker clarified his position at Bi and deplored to come as “Snotty” in this hint.

“I did not want to slam these films. I really like action films-that’s why I went to Nyu, to make the next” Dying hard “or” Robocop “,” he told Bi. “What I was trying to say is that I want the studios to still make other films.”

Baker stressed that it is logical that the studios have priority for these films, knowing that they will work better financially. “Gender films are essentially the films that keep theaters alive, and therefore I cherish them, and I am so happy that they are there,” he said. “But I would just like more variety – dramas and dramas and everyday human stories.”

He argued that these films without explosion are just as cinematographic, and just as important to see on the big screen surrounded by a crowd of films lovers. “Anora” was the proof of Baker’s concept: “I want” anora “to be something better in a theater with a crowd on the big screen.”

This “anora” has been adopted in this way is a huge victory for independent cinema, which should serve as a index for studios that these films are worth the marketing effort – is the director’s most successful film to date, which reports more than $ 40 million worldwide with a budget of $ 6 million.

“I’m just trying to make the best possible film,” Baker told Bi. “When something is too commercial, there is a reason. It is often watered down to reach the widest possible public. And therefore, it is not as provocative or annoyed, because it must be enough vanilla to reach everyone.”

The 97th Academy Awards may have been an end of fairy tale for Baker as a filmmaker, but it may also be the fairy that the godmother needs.

Closing his speech of acceptance of the best film, Baker said clearly.

“I would like to thank the Academy for recognizing a really independent film. This film was made on blood, sweat and tears of independent artists. And an independent film live.”