Hot Girls Wanted: Turned On (2017)

Series 1 Episode 5: Take Me Private

In general, this series is really good research for our Grad Film as each episode deals with something different regarding the sex industry.

The episode I found particularly relevant is episode 5, which is about a cam girl named Alice, who has a regular viewer who wants to take their relationship to the next level. This viewer sends her a lot of money and pays for different things in her life, hoping that this is sealing a romantic bond between the two of them, even though Alice is married and he knows this.
Basically, the episode shows Alice's life on cam, and her particularly close relationship with this regular viewer, leading to him paying for her to go visit him. It indicates how cam girls can become a huge part of their viewers lives, ultimately leading to the viewers expressing intimate feelings although they barely know each other.

I found this all particularly interesting as it shows how cam girls are actually an important part of people's lives, and are not just viewed as sex objects for people to masturbate to. The man in this particular episode explains how he has romantic feelings for Alice, and that they have a friendship and often just video chat for general conversation and not just sexual gains. This subverts the typical view that cam girls are just seen as sexual 'objects' that make money by stripping and performing sexual acts on camera. 

CAM GIRLZ (2015)

"Cam Girlz enters the world of webcam sex workers who find economic freedom, empowerment, intimacy and creative self expression from the comfort of their own homes"

https://topdocumentaryfilms.com/cam-girlz/

I came across this documentary whilst conducting some general research on cam girls. It shows a variety of girls who work online as sex workers, letting them tell their stories and explain why they might be in this industry. I found it really interesting to watch and listen to, taking a lot of inspiration from it.

This documentary does really well in not objectifying the women, and allowing them to speak freely about their job and what they do, it doesn't feel uncomfortable to watch. As the sound was just laid over the top it didn't feel intimidating or like they were being questioned, they just spoke as if in conversation with the viewer. 

This documentary has brought me to think about the sorts of questions I would want to ask the girls in my documentary to make them feel comfortable talking about what they do, and not as though they are being interrogated. Also if they are in their own environment they will feel more comfortable in general.

Although I do think in some ways it was beneficial to explore the lives of so many cam girls, I know that in my own documentary I would like to focus on maybe one or two individuals in order to have a more in depth look at their lives and a more intimate feel to the documentary.

This documentary does a really good job at showing a lot of different girls with different views, making you understand that these are humans, not just something people 'get off' to. This is something I want to achieve in my own documentary, bringing realism and making you connect with the subject  

Grad Film - Initial Ideas

Surrounding the inital idea of the sex industry...

THINGS TO THINK ABOUT:

• history of erotica
• women as pornographic objects
• "peep shows"
• dangerous exposure
• romanticism by the media
• ease of the industry
• modeling themselves into compliant objects
• how easy is it to escape?
• presentational viewing > cam girls
• online behaviours
• industry angles; dominatrix, sado-masochism, brothels, swinging, sex play
• fetishes and fixations
• objectification and camera rights
• rights of passage associated with sex

visual approach > issue of diversity, gender, race, objectification etc.

YEAR 3 - FINAL YEAR

The past two years have flown by, and here I am in the final year of my degree. This year I will be making a grad film and writing a dissertation. 

I have a lot of ideas surrounding my grad film, and will be collaborating with Alice Ball, who I have worked with consistently in the past. 

We want to stick with the loose themes of feminism, but want to branch out of our comfort zone and produce something unlike the work we have made before. I have been thinking a lot about the porn/sex industry and how it would be interesting to make a documentary surrounding this, focusing on female sex workers and how they fit into this male dominated world.

I have already watched a lot of documentaries on this topic purely due to my own personal interest, and would like to make something that relates to this as I think there is more to be explored.

Alice and I will have a further brainstorm about what route we want to take.