In post-9/11 New York City, an eclectic group of citizens find their lives entangled, personally, romantically, and sexually, at Shortbus, an underground Brooklyn salon infamous for its blend of art, music, politics, and carnality.
Eva, an upper-class housewife, frustratedly leaves her arrogant husband and decides to enter the call girl business. She lets Yvonne, a prostitute, teach her the basics and both set out for prey together, until Eva starts an affair with Chris, who turns out to be a call boy, as well. Consequently, she moves into his penthouse, large enough for both to offer their services separately.
Single mother Diana struggles to provide for her child and pay for her college education. When she meets two dancers from a nearby gentlemen's club, Diana's convinced there's fast money to be made stripping.
A psychiatrist encourages his female patients to tell him their sexual problems, each as each relates her particular case, we see it in flashback.
Alberta, a mousy young woman with the survival skills of a snail, loses cash that isn't hers, so she runs from her small town to Seattle where her old babysitter, Celene, lives - a dominatrix with a classy apartment and a life plan. She lets Alberta stay. Alberta gets a job as a checker at a supermarket and becomes fascinated with Celene's work.
Country girl Rebecca has spent most of her life on a farm in South Dakota, and, when she goes away to college in Los Angeles, Rebecca immediately feels out of place in the daunting urban setting. She is befriended by a savvy party animal named Crawl, who convinces the ambivalent Rebecca to stay in the city. When Thanksgiving break rolls around, Rebecca, no longer an innocent farm girl, invites Crawl back to South Dakota, where he pretends to be her fiancé.
Maria, an unfortunate young woman, kills her rapist father in self-defense, and is later tried, sentenced, and shipped off to a woman's penitentiary where she and her fellow inmates are subjected to psychological and sexual abuse at the hands of a psychotic lesbian warden.
Identity and performance, resistance and submission, and monotony and quiet rage crash into one another in this clear-eyed vision of a lesbian working as a professional dominatrix with a police officer as a regular client.
An ambitious young woman from a wealthy family, but unsatisfied with her social position, will not hesitate to use all that is within her reach to achieve her ascent in society.
A young boy and his sister are drawn into one man's obsessive pursuit of his former lover.
Inspired by the Baader-Meinhof gang, a film about modern left Germans adopting the culture of extreme left-wing movements of the 1970s. East German dominatrix Gudrun leads a revolutionary gang of her own in Berlin. She has her men kidnap the son of a rich businessman in order to gain publicity. Claiming that heterosexuality is a social norm created to keep the people down, she forces her male minions to have sex with each other.
After experiencing a tragic event, a teenager is comforted by an older French woman who convinces him that an S&M relationship will help him heal.
A portrait of Rosa von Praunheim's neighbor, who worked for decades as a professional dominatrix in Berlin's Wilmersdorf district. While the real Lady MacLaine reflects authentically and wittily on her life and work, her life is retold in dramatized scenes.
Marie, a teenage vagabond whose lust for life will eventually lead her to the bed of the mysterious Sandra. What begins as a blissful relationship soon takes a violent turn however, as Sandra tries to take full control over the innocent girl's life.
Dom is the story of Jade, a young woman torn between her search for spirituality and her dark life as a dominatrix. Her powerful spoken word poetry ignites the interest of a young rockstar and when her world is shattered by death and violence, Jade must choose between control and giving herself up to love.
"My Normal" is the story of Natalie, a young lesbian from the Lower East Side, who's struggling to find a balance between her dreams of becoming a film maker and her lifestyle as a dominatrix. Her exotic looks and unconventional techniques make her one of the most desirable mistresses in the NYC underground. After befriending her weed dealer and igniting a steamy love affair with her new girl, Natalie gets an internship on a real movie set. But if everything she ever wanted is becoming a reality, why is her life falling apart? When it seems that all is lost, Natalie realizes that the only way to turn her dreams into reality is to use her unique talents as a dominatrix to get exactly what she wants.
When Sam learns his mother cannot afford to send him to another school after he is kicked out, he and his friends start their own escort service for mature women to pay for his tuition.
Jack is an internet gambler living in NYC. After the death of his roommate, he becomes fixated on Scarlet - a cam girl from San Francisco. His obsession reaches a boiling point when fantasy materializes in reality and Jack sees Scarlet on a rainy NYC Chinatown street.
Confined to a claustrophobic hotel room, the heir to a hotel empire and the dominatrix who has primed him for success become locked in a battle of wits and wills as he tries to end his relationship with her.
A female talent scout takes a down-on-his-luck construction worker under her wing and helps him rise to his potential as a singer/songwriter.