Hidden Image/Members OnlyThe only problem is that's it's in French...
External Link/Members OnlyI went to a special English-subtitled screening the other night of film called Une Femme du Monde and there was a Q&A with the female director afterwards.
It stars the excellent Laure Calamy (best known as the secretary boffing her boss in Dix Pour Cent/Call My Agent), who plays a middle-aged hooker in Strasbourg trying to get her layabout son into a school for chefs.
The film shows prostitutes decrying the French law that criminalises their clients because it drives their trade "into the darkness".
The director said afterwards that she wanted to make a film showing that for some women selling their bodies is a rational and voluntary decision, some enjoy it very much and, except for those who are trafficked and pimped, most would happily choose it over a regular job. "I wanted to show that not all prostitutes are victims," she said.
She has been applauded for the resulting film by the hookers who helped her with the research but because the script goes against the grain of accepted thought on the subject it took her seven years to raise the finance.
The only false note is that the character works from home with a few regular punters but otherwise goes out to solicit on the streets, and at one stage to work in a German brothel. I'm sure such an organised and confident woman (she pays her taxes and tells her son and her bank manager what she does) would have an internet profile in real life, but the film doesn't go there.
I can't see any current way to see the subtitled version – or any version except in a French cinema. Hopefully when a DVD comes out the titles will be there.
