Writer-director Josephine Mackerras’s bouncy but uneven feature debut follows a middle-class Parisian woman’s first foray into sex work. Learning that her husband, François (Martin Swabey), has frittered away their savings and her inheritance on boutique escorts, Alice (Emilie Piponnier) decides that she might give it a go herself. High-class sex work is presented as a financial quick fix and a route to female empowerment, but the film’s sex-positive politics gloss over any of the job’s potential pitfalls.
The point is hammered home when Alice and fellow escort Lisa (Chloé Boreham) pop champagne on the Seine and scream “fuck ’em” (in English) at judgmental naysayers. Alice never experiences anything even mildly threatening, with Mackerras preferring to present the sex scenes as comedy set pieces. Piponnier is, however, a lanky joy to watch, all awkward, flailing limbs and expressive Bambi eyes.
