There are movies made for adults, and then there are movies that confuse “adult” with “adolescent in a wet-dream stupor.” Anora, Sean Baker’s latest stumble masquerading as a comedy-drama, is a film with all of its clothes off and nothing to show but skin. The only thing less substantial than the threadbare plot is the flimsily clad pretense that we ought to care about this endless, joyless parade of nudity and nonsense.
Is there any modern screen fantasy more seductive than the con artist—our era’s answer to the movie gangster, only happier to work out of a hotel bar than a speakeasy, and more at home lifting watches or hearts than gunning anyone down? In Focus, Glenn Ficarra and John Requa try to fine-tune that old grift-and-romance two-step for the millennial crowd, trotting out Will Smith as a slick virtuoso of deception, whose real legerdemain ends up being the ability to keep Margot Robbie (who, here, has the sparkle and bounce of a new convertible) on her toes, and, at least for a while, the audience on theirs.