When I was first asked to review The Pink House I was beyond excited. The film is about Questa Casa, the oldest brothel in Kalgoorlie, which has been operating since 1904. What I imagined was a saucy featurette steeped in history about the oldest profession in history and the history behind Hay Street, Kalgoorlie’s red light district. But mostly, I was hoping for some amazing stories and the salacious history of this longest running brothel. What The Pink House confronts viewers with is an open story about how technology, drugs and sex slavery have fast destroyed this little pink corrugated iron piece of history.
Carmel, the current Madam of Questa Casa, too closely reminded me of my own mother. A women in her 70’s who is elegant, articulate and takes no nonsense from her women and her visiting Johns but seems severely out of place as a brothel Madam. Carmel has never been in the sex industry and her idea of running this business is to hold on to the past, rather than attempting to move with the times. This situation is reminiscent of a major Australian electrical chain that refused to move to online shopping, and took a major hit to its bottom line.
Questa Casa and Carmel rely upon its history rather than trying to reach out for new clientele, and how most of us actually get our rocks off – by using the world wide web! But it’s not just a failure to advertise that is threatening this little piece of history. The alleged human trafficking of the Asian brothels and their undercutting fees place The Pink House as high end in price without the high end workers. Insert BJ, the featured worker of Questa Casa. A mid forties overweight sex worker, who has had a long standing history of drug use, sexual abuse and a pretty rough trot at life. This film watches Carmel try to keep BJ on the straight and narrow at the Pink House, but we see BJ slide down a very slippery slope of drugs, backyard prostitution and even murder!
A fee of $230 for an hour with BJ versus $60 odd for a nearby Asian worker makes you wonder how the Pink House will survive?
At the end of this film I felt bereft. What originally started out with feelings of excitement left me cold and disappointed. I was watching a piece of history die because its bond to the past was preventing it moving into the future. Would I recommend seeing this film? The Pink House is a test of endurance; Audiences must persevere watching a sex worker’s downfall into drugs and murder and a Madam who really had no idea what she was doing as a small business owner.
The Pink House will be released via Demand.Film. There is a screening happening at Palace Cinemas Norton Street, Leichhardt on Wednesday November 1st.
Using Demand.Film, any person or organisation can ‘host’ a film listed on the Demand.film site, create an event around it, and then use their own social media network to sell tickets to their friends and online community. Demand.film, in turn, reserves the theatre, manages ticketing, and ensures the delivery of the film. Once the ticket threshold is reached, everyone just sits back and enjoys the show.
