Neon's Anora tells the story of a young sex worker from Brooklyn, who gets a chance at a Cinderella story when she meets and impulsively marries the son of an oligarch. Once the news reaches Russia, her fairytale is threatened as the parents set out for New York to get the marriage annulled.
The feature was directed by Sean Baker and shot by director of photography Drew Daniels back in January of 2023. Mikey Madison stars in the title role.
Andy Hay, CAS, and John Warrin, CAS, MPSE, served as re-recording mixers and supervising sound editors on the project. Hay initially worked with Baker on 2017’s The Florida Project. He then supervised and mixed 2021’s
Red Rocket.
“I asked John to join me as co-supervisor and to mix the sound effects,” Hay recalls of Red Rocket. “We all had the best time working together at John’s facility, Esho Sound, and Sean was so happy with the results that he asked us back for Anora.”
Hay described Baker as a “dream client,” who is very clear in what he wants from a soundtrack.
“He’ll guide us in terms of how he wants to feel in any given moment, and trusts us to interpret those ideas and make choices that deliver on those intended emotions,” Hay explains. “There is no score in the film and only occasionally does the source music function as score. As such, we rely much more heavily on the sound design and how loudly or quietly we mix those elements to act as underscore throughout the film.”
Warrin notes that Baker’s style is to keep the odd sounds captured during production.
“Before the dialogue editors start, we tell them to keep all the stuff in,” Warrin reveals. “They can get rid of the clicks, pops and hum, but are instructed to leave in all the other stuff happening around the dialogue, and then we remove what we need during the mix. I love it, because that was in line with my approach to creative sound design and music production.”
Warrin notes that Anora’s soundtrack is unique in that much of the feature was shot in a documentary style.
“There’s a ton going on in the production tracks, not only people talking on top of each other, but crowds and sometimes music, and all sorts of stuff,” he explains. “It presents a big challenge, because it all has to flow together. The scene in Tatiana’s was especially challenging. There really was a party going on in that scene, in real life! So there’s all sorts of bleed that we have to deal with and make seamless, which our dialogue editors — Jesse Pomeroy and Nick Pavey — handled wonderfully.”
Hay calls attention to two scenes that are his favorite in Anora. In one, Ani and company return to the strip club to pull Ivan out of a private lap dance.
“It’s absolute chaos, with everyone yelling over each other,” Hay shares. “We need clarity on all of their dialog and all of their intentions. That was a delicate balancing act to give everyone their due.”
Another highlight, he shares, is the final scene, with Ani in the car.
“The rattle of the Mercedes engine anchors us in reality, while the pitter patter of snowfall conversely evokes a feeling of calm,” shares Hay, “but it’s the progression of the squeaky windshield wipers that go from annoying and harsh to almost imperceptible and, dare I say, soothing, that underscore Ani’s emotional progression throughout the scene. That squeaky windshield wiper is largely from production and had its own natural progression that we further manipulated in sound editorial to better match the emotional pace of the scene, and then layered additional field recording elements of the wiper mechanism to enhance that progression.”
“The final scene in the car is one of my favorite scenes in the movie, as well,” adds Warrin. “We've had so many people commenting to us about the sound of that scene, which is great, because Andy and I spent a good amount of time on that scene to get it to work both emotionally and temporally.”