FILM REVIEW Prostitute

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For a film produced solely by men "Prostitute" is a gripping and sympathetic insight into the everyday lives of women prostitutes.

Shot in a documentary film style, Tony Garnett (the director) brings the audience closer to the feel of the women portrayed.

The scene is set in a multi-racial, working class region of Birmingham amidst the dilapidated streets of an obviously run-down area.

Nearly all the prostitutes are mothers who, contrary to stilted public opinion, take their responsibilities seriously. The absence of men, in the role of husband, father or lover, is conspicuous. Whether this is due to the particular relationship they have with men by virtue of their profession is not examined in the film.

In any case, little respect or acknowledgement is given towards men in their conversations, except in a derogatory sense. Yet there is a feeling of solidarity within the prostitutes community; the women often rallying together to help look after children whilst a mother undergoes imprisonment. (With the help of a sympathetic social worker, the prostitutes try to organise themselves).

Eager that some form of organisation is set up to help prostitutes against the discriminating arm of the law, the women are equally suspicious of any moralistic preaching or hints of reform.

Prostitution is seen as just another job. One which offers greater financial rewards than any factory job could-even if they were easy to get-and the hours can be made to fit in with the children's needs.

Whether this attitude is justifiable in a political sense, (something which we have yet to iron out), this is how these women view their profession.

Garnett also shows how different working class prostitution is from it's middle class equivalent. Perhaps not, so much directly, as in the attitudes and consciousness behind the act.

When | Sandra (the central character) attends a businessmen's convention, she is at a loss. Contact with her clients on the streets seems clearcut by comparison.

The prostitute gets into a car, has sex, gets out and waits for the next customer. Dialogue is minimal, interest is nil.

be Vity and ook intested in their clients lt they are to score. The role play needed in this situation is completely at odds with the defined prostitute/client line Sandra is used to. However, the money is good, and she meets a sophisticated prostitute from London who offers the possibility of a job.

This decision is not welcomed by the social worker who wants Sandra to stav in Birmingham and help build the prostitutes action committee. They are friends and live in the same house (much to the disapproval of the social services department).

There is a hilarious yet telling interlude within the film when the social worker meets a trendy sociology lecturer at a conference. A great deal of time is spent in theorising about sex, yet when they actually stop talking long enough to actually get around to it, their sexual advances are embarrassingly awkward and self conscious.

This scene produces more red faces amongst the audience (myself included) than any other explicit sexual act involving the prostitutes.

reference to the sexual morality that even the most 'liberated' middle class people struggle to overcome. This uneasiness is highlighted when Sandra proclaims that at least she isn't stupid enough to give it away for free!

Needless to say, the social worker never meets up with the trendy lecturer again. He goes happily back to his wife and family after securing a weekend with 'a bit on the side'.

Yet we all know that this is a million miles away from prostituting yourself... don't we?

Perhaps Garnett is suggesting that the outcome of these two women's actions are much the same, with only the degree to which it is done making one acceptable and the other not.

Anyhow, Sandra leaves for London and with the help of her contact is introduced to a woman who runs a prostitution racket (who is unfortunately portrayed as a "butch" Madame).

She enters the world of fantasy eroticism and hard-core prostitution. After a series of grotesque encounters she tinally stops working for the agency and decides to go it alone, Moving into a new area she is totally inexperienced in the dealings of the organised crime syndicate and soon falls prey to the local protection racket. This experience induces her to go back home to the relative security and safety of her old haunts.

Meanwhile, the social worker has finally got some recognition for her work. A television network is interested in making a documentary about the lives of prostitutes, with a difference.

Things look promising, but as Sandra steps out onto the Birmingham streets again, the vice squad is not far away.

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On 1 March Bobby Sands began a hunger strike to the death in the H Blocks of Long Kesh concentration camp.

The | following day all the republican prisoners both in the H Blocks and in Armagh jail came off the "no-wash" protest. This protest started in 1978 in the H Blocks and last April in the women's prison in Armagh.

The women were beaten up and kept in their cells for 48 hours and denied the use of toilet and washing facilities. They tried in desperation to empty their overflowing chamber pots out of the window but the warders barred these up, allowing no natural light and fresh air into the cells.l At the end of this period the prison authorities offered the women the use of the toilet as a privilege which could be withdrawn at any time.

The women demanded the use of a toilet as a basic human right but were refused this. The women faced no alternative than living in The women in Armagh, all young, working, class women, have been imprisoned for allegedly playing a part in the war that has been going on in the six counties for the past twelve years.

They come from working class districts that have been attacked by loyalist gangs, the police (RUC), and the British Army.

80% of male and female prisoners have been convicted on the basis of a statement signed under torture in the army and police interrogation centres.

They have been tried in special secret non-jury Diplock Courts. All are in prison for their part in alleged political offences and have been arrested, tried and sentenced under special emergency legislation. Their demand in the hunger strike was and is for recognition as political prisoners. massive street demonstrations and a wave of -there. were strikes in support of the prisoners. Confronted by this working class anger and Women in Armagh will also be joining the hunger strike but no date has been set as yet.

The British Army was sent to the six counties in 1969, not "to keep the peace", as the bosses would have us believe, but to hold back the Catholic working class which had taken to the streets in its tens of thousands demanding decent housing, jobs, a decent wage and the right to control decisions affecting their daily lives.

Occupation

The prisoners in Armagh and the H Blocks have been imprisoned for fighting to get the British Army out of Ireland.

Their struggle is part of the daily struggle of the Irish working class against police and army repression and terrible poverty-imposed on them by the same class enemy that is attacking the living standards and political the bosses' policy on Ireland. This is the same leadership that time and again holds back British workers in their struggles around jobs, wages and living conditions.

There is an urgent need to raise the issue of the Irish prisoners in trade union branches and the Labour Party. It is necessary to pass resolutions in support of the prisoners' demands and demand of those labour leaders who have already given token support that they fight for action in support of the prisoners.

The fight to take up the cause of the Irish prisoners is part of the fight for working class action in Britain to force the withdrawal of the British army from Ireland.

Mary