Exotic

EMPOWER is a series of three portraits of sex workers with heterogeneous trajectories crossing paths of migration, Trans identities, feminism, the fight against HIV, the fight against precariousness and discrimination. Interweaving personal journeys, political analysis, and strategies of collective resistance, Aying, Giovanna Murillo Rincon, and Mylène Juste demand for the rights of minorities. Far from the objectification often at work in documentaries, EMPOWER is a tribute to the voices of sex workers through an active collaboration in production with the protagonists.

Two foreigners meet in Barcelona and become friends after discovering that they both work in the same business: sex work. Their conversations offer an insider’s view into the differences between women and men in the sex industry.

Em is an escort girl and a heroin addict. From New York to Los Angeles via Pittsburgh, Em’s daily life is revealed.

Diana, Ilana, Rona, Shelly, Rucha and Liat openly speak about their life in prostitution: from the initial lure, through learning the rules, to survival strategies. They present stories of independence, resourcefulness, pain and trauma, expressing an extreme feminine and human experience. Michaela (pseudonym) – a young woman currently engaged in prostitution, sounds off on the struggle to survive, turning her cellphone camera into a weapon. The women challenge what is expected of them – to be ashamed and conceal themselves.

1961 documentary about the history and seedy reality of the sex industry in London's Soho.

Call it acting or prostitution; the phone sex phenomenon reflects the darker side of the telemarketing industry. From the absurd to the disturbing. Mind Fuck is a brave foray into the strange and fascinating psychological world of phone sex in which the real operators, normally stuck on the receiving end of the line, finally get to freely speak their mind.

The history of New York’s Meatpacking District, told from the perspective of transgender sex workers who lived and worked there. Filmmaker Kristen Lovell, who walked “The Stroll” for a decade, reunites her community to recount the violence, policing, homelessness, and gentrification they overcame to build a movement for transgender rights.

21st century legal prostitution through the frank stories of Amsterdam red-light district sex workers at a time when tighter regulation threatens their livelihood.

Radical feminist Andrea Dworkin's expose on the pornography industry.

Is it anyone's business if consenting adults want to pay or accept money for sex? Sex worker and author Maggie McNeill tells her startling tale about the persecution of sex workers based on the false assumption that most of them are exploited victims of pimps and traffickers. Her movement is challenging these assumptions and the powerful political and cultural forces behind them.

Enter the universe of three mujra dancers in Pakistan as they dodge state censorship and violence to vie for stardom.

A look behind the scenes of the Czech gay porn boom.

Fadma, 75, tells her life story including being recruited as a sex worker for the French army aged 20, and her views on love, parenthood, and destiny.

Documentary about the Lyon sex workers who occupied the church of St. Nizier on June 3, 1975.

A documentary about prostitution in New York. Featuring interviews with all parties mentioned in the title.

Documentary look at the 1996-97 effort of the dancers and support staff at a San Francisco peep show, The Lusty Lady, to unionize. Angered by arbitrary and race-based wage policies, customers' surreptitious video cameras, and no paid sick days or holidays, the dancers get help from the Service Employees International local and enter protracted bargaining with the union-busting law firm that management hires. We see the women work, sort out their demands, and go through the difficulties of bargaining. The narrator is Julia Query, a dancer and stand-up comedian who is reluctant to tell her mother, a physician who works with prostitutes, that she strips.

A group of prostitutes in Rio de Janeiro who fight to obtain rights and reduce stigma, create a clothing label that quickly invades Brazilian fashion shows. Poster photo by Daniela Pinheiro.

Bold documentary exploring the lives of high-class prostitutes Miss Emily B and Cookie Jane, who charge thousands of pounds for a night with clients who find them through new location-based apps.

A collection of stories from the Sex Worker Freedom Festival that took place in Kolkata 2012.

"Ni Coupables, ni victimes" ("Not Guilty, Not Victims") is a polyphonic conversation gathering the words of some of the protagonists at the European Conference on Sex Work, Human Rights, Labour and Migration, Brussels (2005). They speak of the complexity and nuances of the sex industry and their lives: the challenges and the struggles of being a sex worker in Europe today, the repressive policies affecting their lives, and the strategies of resistance enabling them to do their work, build their desires and plan their futures.