photo by Erlin  Mandelmann.jpg. Painting by Grisélidis Réal

This link is to the trailer for the documentary “Death of a whore” by Harmonia Carmona.
Starting with the death of Grisélidis Réal, the documentary covers stages of her life  and explores issues of prostitution with her friends.

Through a discourse on social roles, death, culture, women’s and prostitutes’ rights, this work provides an intimate and powerful examination of one of the early and great prostitutes’ rights activists of the twentieth century.

(English subtitles available for screenings by request)

Below is a poem by Griselidis Real that I didn’t find on the internet, as portrayed in this movie.

Death of a Whore

Bury me naked
as I came into the world
from out of the belly of my unknown mother.
Bury me standing
Without money
Without clothes
Without jewels
Without decorations.
Without make-up
Without adornments
Without a veil. Without rings
Without anything.
Without Necklaces
or earrings of fine gold.
Without lipstick or eyeliner.
With my closed eyes I want
to see the world recede,
the stars and the sun to fall
the night to expand
unto its origin
and entomb me in its mouth.
To lie down one last time
to stretch out alone at last
like a diamond
full of earth.
To rest.
To finally sleep.
To sleep. To sleep.
Without thinking of anything else forever.
To die
To die. To die.
To die and to finally meet
my mother again
and to recognize in your smile
the innocence
I’ve lacked.
All my life I’ve looked for you.
I’ve found you so as to be able to lose
and to tell you,
finally, I love you.

https://www.colectivohetaira.org/muertedeunaputa0506.html. notes

DEATH OF A WHORE  

Stories of love, solidarity and commitment full of joy and transforming will. Never before have these terms been associated with the world of prostitution. “Muerte de una puta” is an unprecedented visualization of sex work that presents us with exceptional women who transgress all prejudices.

On May 31, 2005, the most famous and mediatic prostitute in Switzerland, Grisélidis Réal, died in Geneva. The journey through her biography will take us to meet unusual landscapes and women. Prostitutes from Belgium, Switzerland, Italy and Spain who have shared with her a unique way of experiencing sex work. They are women who narrate their experience in prostitution in a positive way and who in turn lead the most active European groups in the defense of the regularization of sex work.

They speak to us of prostitution without ambiguity. Uncovered face. With them we will know the most unknown side of prostitution: The most domestic and personal. If until now the portraits of prostitutes have focused on describing their professional activity, “Muerte de una puta” tells us about her life outside prostitution: her home, her family, her friends, her hobbies … All of them aspects that they enrich the more conventional and well-known representations of prostitution.

THE CONTEXT

In the world, the circulation of women destined for the sex trade is estimated at 4 million people. The statistics published in the media put more than 300,000 women in prostitution in Spain. More than 90% immigrants. A business that is estimated to move around 18,000 million euros a year in our country.

Despite its magnitude, prostitution continues in Spain without a legal framework of rights and duties for the people involved in this industry.

THE PROTAGONISTS

Grisélidis Réal

practiced prostitution from 1962 to 1995. Her emblematic phrase was “Prostitution is an art, a humanism and a science”

Sonia Verstappen

She offers sexual services in her showcase in the hottest district of Brussels. “If I could, I would change many things in my life, but not my profession”

Marianne Bauweraerts

Former sex worker. “In the eyes of society, if you have been a prostitute, you remain so all your life”

Carla Corso

Retired sex worker. “I always felt treated like a queen when I was working as a prostitute. My only suffering has been the marginalization that society has imposed on me ”

Pia Covre

Together with Carla, founder of the Committee for the Civil Rights of Prostitutes in Italy. “Prostitution for a woman can be an emancipation”

Margarita Carreras

Prostitute in the streets of Raval in Barcelona. “As a prostitute I rent my time and my knowledge. I never sell myself … because the client cannot take me home ”

Claudette

Prostitute veteran, practices prostitution in the Paqui neighborhood of Geneva. “We are no more miserable than a secretary who has to put up with her boss”

THE DIRECTOR

Harmonía Carmona (Barcelona, 1962)

Audiovisual director and scriptwriter since 1989. Her previous documentary “Under the skin of the conflict” (56 ‘) won the Prize of the Humanistic-Social Section at the XXII International Biennial of Scientific Film in Ronda. “Un certain Mulibahan (58)” and “Sama Samaruck Suck Suk (27 ‘)” complete his filmography as a documentary filmmaker, although what distinguishes his career is the diversity of genres he has produced. Fiction, experimental videos, commercials and video clips for artists such as Pedro Guerra, Carlos Núñez or Víctor Manuel.

She is also a teacher and collaborator of the Creative Documentary Master at the Autonomous University of Barcelona.

DEFINITION OF FORM AND CONTENT

The value of the documentary lies in the personality, intelligence and heterodoxy of its characters. “Muerte de una puta” is not a transgressive documentary, but its protagonists are.

The directing work has focused on listening with the greatest possible austerity, returning the interview to its original value. In this sense, the formal objectives have focused on meticulously visualizing the landscapes that correspond to each of the protagonists.

LOCATIONS

“Death of a whore” has been shot in Switzerland (Geneva), Italy (Venice and Trieste), Belgium (Brussels and Antwerp) and Spain (Barcelona).

Geneva is the city where Grisélidis Réal, the absent protagonist of the documentary, lived and died. In Italy we visited one of the historical capitals of prostitution, Venice and Carla Corso and Pia Covre. In Brussels we attended a European conference of prostitutes and we visited Sonia Verstappen. In Antwerp to Marianne Brawerarts.

TECHNICAL DATA:

TITLE: DEATH OF A WHORE

DURATION: 90 MINUTES

FORMAT: DIGITAL HDV 16/9

DIRECTOR and SCRIPT HARMONIA CARMONA

DTOR. PHOTOGRAPH: ANTONI ANGLADA

CAMARA 2ND UNIT: DAVID AMELL

DIRECT SOUND: MARC SOLDEVILA

EDITING: CARLOS PRIETO

ORIGINAL MUSIC: LAURA TERUEL

HEAD OF PRODUCTION: AMÉLIE SAILLEZ

EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: JOSE PEDRO ESTEPA

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF PRODUCTION: PEDRO ERQUICIA