Ranking the Films of Sean Baker

For years now, Sean Baker has been one of the most underrated storytellers in the business. The way he de-stigmatizes and humanizes sex work, as well as characters/locations on the fringes of society, it’s truly one of a kind. It hasn’t translated into Academy Award attention just yet, but Anora now has him in the thick of the race. We legitimately are just a few months out from Baker becoming an Oscar nominee. I’ve spoken to Baker here and here, but with Anora now in theaters, it seems only apt to give him this treatment. After all, he’s on a run of terrific films that’s hard to match.

Below, you can see my ranking of Baker’s movies. There’s a slightly unique take that I have here, at least in how I organize the list. You’ll understand in a moment, but it won’t shock you to find out that I think his three best works are, in alphabetical order, Anora, The Florida Project, and Red Rocket. You won’t find a bad one in the bunch, but those are, at least to date, his crowning achievements. The full order is up next…

Here now is how I would rank the films of Sean Baker, so far. Behold:

6. Four Letter Words / Take Out / Prince of Broadway – I lumped these three together because they’re sort of proto Sean Baker. All of the things we’d come to know from him are here, but it’s still very formative. Prince of Broadway is the best of the bunch and the one to seek out if you’re curious, but it’s a situation where the best is very much yet to come.

5. Tangerine – Admittedly, I only like instead of love this movie, but it’s still very well done. Tangerine is a little shaggier than his best work, while the flick sort of got swallowed up in the “made on an iPhone” of it all. At the same time, again, it’s still a really good work. This is arguably the most unique work of his career, taking a story that perhaps only he and his co-writer at the time Chris Bergoch could have done, and acing it.

4. Starlet – The film that really first established Baker in my eyes is this surprise buddy drama. Initially just a look at an older woman being befriended by a younger woman, it evolves into something much more than that. Sex work, surprises, and a frank sense of life, as well as comedy, are all in evidence. It’s the best film of his that too few people have seen, so definitely try to catch up on this one. Starlet is a little gem.

3. The Florida Project – Up until now, The Florida Project was Baker’s closest brush with the Academy Awards, scoring that sole Best Supporting Actor nomination for Willem Dafoe. The film deserved so much more than that, however, as the depiction of childhood innocence juxtaposed with adult struggles is downright heartbreaking. This movie started the drumbeat that Baker and his works deserved to be seen as at least prestige adjacent, and I will always treasure it for that.

2. Red Rocket – It’s no secret that I was all-in for Red Rocket a few years ago and I’m still way into it. Unleashing Simon Rex on the world was a stroke of genius, as was taking a real current anxiety about a certain con artist and crafting it into a comedy. Mikey is sleazy as hell, but most people who see the flick still kind of love him. My rave review back then includes this opening:

I’m so delighted that storytellers like Sean Baker and Chris Bergoch exist. Truly, they’re cinematic savants, able to find brilliant tales set within society’s fringes. If there’s a person who no one else would think of making a film about, Baker and Bergoch are almost guaranteed to find the beauty and the heartbreak in their situation. Red Rocket is yet another example of this. In fact, they’ve found riotous comedy in a situation almost no one else would play for laughs, while retaining all of their trademark heart. Playing at the 59th New York Film Festival, Red Rocket is not just the best of the fest, but one of the crowning achievements of 2021. All hail these slightly demented geniuses.

Red Rocket can certainly be read in a political context, but some of the earliest reviews that presented Simon Rex‘s protagonist as a Donald Trump-like figure are grasping at straws. Sure, this is also a vain huckster, but there’s so much heart and almost child-like innocence to this fictional creation. Watching him be awful is amusing, not enraging. It’s a notable choice that makes the character study not just fascinating, but wildly entertaining as well.

1. Anora – Yes, Anora is Baker’s best so far. Between seeing how in control of his craft the man is, as well as the showcase for Mikey Madison, it’s everything that Baker does so well, just blowing you away from start to finish. It’s the best film of 2024 in my eyes, which should tell you something. Nothing else comes close. My four star rave review here begins like so:

Sean Baker has made a career out of de-stigmatizing sex work. He’s clearly fascinated by characters who exist, to one degree or another, on the margins of society, seen as “other” in some way. Not only does it set him apart as a storyteller, it leads to some incredibly unique works. Starlet, Tangerine, The Florida Project, and Red Rocket have all established him as a poet laureate for these people. Now, with Anora, Baker has upped his game even more. In crafting his first romance, as well as leaning a bit more into plot, he’s made his fullest cinematic meal yet. This is not just the best thing I’ve seen so far at the Telluride Film Festival, it’s the best movie of the year so far.

Anora is a wild ride. It begins as Baker’s take on Pretty Woman, before evolving into something more akin to a night out thriller. After Hours has been evoked by some, as well as Cinderella by Baker himself, but none of this prepares you for the third act. If act one is comedy and romance, act two retains some of the laughs while also bringing in danger, act three takes it all home with a real sense of tragedy as well. This is an auteur fully in control of his craft.

What are your favorite Sean Baker films? Let us know!