The prostitute O'Rourke discovers after trolling the pleasure palaces of Bangkok's Patpong district, sampling various wares and women as part of his research, is a petite 25-year-old nicknamed Aoi.
Aoi, we learn through her own on-camera confessions and by watching the testimony of her "aunty" - an elderly, cud-chewing farm woman - fled her home in the rice paddies of Udon to make money in the city. Becoming a prostitute was virtually inevitable: Her story is one of abandonment and debt; she had a child who needed to be clothed and fed; she had no education; it is what many young, poor Thai women do.
O'Rourke's camera bobs and weaves through the narrow streets of the Patpong. He captures sidewalk hawkers ("Hot stuff for lovers," one exclaims, gesturing to the door of his glittery sex club), as well as the naked, blank- faced go-go girls and the customers, Westerners and Asians, who leer at them. Some of the sorriest scenes are those in which a gang of young, drunken Australians rationalize their presence in these clubs and brothels, and their willingness to pay for sex. An American, his head lolling with booze, sings the praises of Thai women - who service you, he says, and then "fold your clothes."
Anthropologically, this seamy travelogue can be fascinating. But O'Rourke is digging for some deeper meaning, and so he focuses on Aoi - her johns, her workmates, her family in the country. (Although Aoi talks about her job, she is never seen in the act of performing it.) Mournful and impassive, she speaks of her loathing for her customers ("All men lie and cheat") and how often she considers suicide.
But O'Rourke's grim portrait of a prostitute is tainted. As the film progresses, it becomes clear that he and his subject have struck a deal: He has bought her a rice farm in payment for her time and talk. What we are witnessing, then, is just another of her many business transactions with men - this one a little more voyeuristic, and even perverse, than most. O'Rourke has paid the woman to record her woes, to capture her on film as she breaks down and cries. And he prods her on.
The documentarian is as guilty of using the woman as the overweight Korean businessman whose hotel room she visited the previous afternoon.
It's a phony relationship, and a phony mission.
THE GOOD WOMAN OF BANGKOK * * 1/2
Produced, directed and photographed by Dennis O'Rourke, music by Mozart, distributed by Roxie Releasing. In English and Thai with subtitles.
Running time: 1 hour, 22 mins.
Featuring Yaiwalak Chonchanakun
Parent's guide: No MPAA rating (nudity, sexual explicitness)
Showing at: Roxy Theatre
