Hot Girls Wanted

What the film tries to tap into is a kind-of shocking female, teenage-exploitation expose narrative, but, instead it uncovers a series of relatively normal, young, stupid and feckless teenagers looking for a way out of their middle-class suburban monotony.

What is supposed to strike you as something akin to sex trafficking (ie imposed drug addiction, systematic dehumanization etc etc) actually reveals an ever-more mainstream industry that has little compunction in playing to the natural vanities and naiveté of emerging female adults, sure, but yet never takes away their choice to leave or stay.

They are paid well, treated like human beings (with the agency and self-determination to board planes to unknown locations with a head full of dreams of being a 'porn star and the hopes of escaping their home town), yet the film still tries desperately to supplant this with a slow descent into infantilization of it's subjects.

The film does not hide that the high turnover of débutantes in this portion of the industry generally wields a 3-4 month cycle for each actress (after the realities of the trade-off of money for loss of reputation and damage to relationships become too much for them to bare, presumably) yet the narrative still implies the idea that it's anything but their own stupidity that has lead them to this.

Unfortunately for the film makers, everything seems 'above board'.

These girls are making 'bad' decisions, defying their parents wishes, wasting money instead of saving it, not thinking about the future or how their decisions effect their romantic life, and yet it's clear that they are having a lot of FUN! All you see is people freely having the liberty to do what hey want, when they want, getting paid and partying till the sun comes up. Seems alright really, doesn't it? It's almost as if it's what being young is all about - Making very bad mistakes through the endeavor of having a good time.

And that's the central dilemma here: How much responsibility do we place on young women to be accountable for all their free choices? The tone here suggests a mixed bag, dependent on the circumstances.

There is definitely an unspoken, Feminist finger being pointed at 'institutions of male power' here, who 'seek to manipulate women for sexual gratification', yet the women make A LOT of cash for their troubles. And as should be well known by now, women make a lot more than men as performers in this industry. Feminists watching this would be careful to invoke the 'wage gap' myth lest the reasoning be turned against them, for example. But, when society sees a woman 'giving' away her chastity so easily and having sex with many people, it suggests the woman is hurting herself. When a man does the same, he is hurting other people. This is patently sexist in itself, implying that women are not capable of making decisions for themselves or being self-reliant enough to learn from said mistakes.

The film does come to a shocking point somewhere towards the end when we see that the girls extended time in the industry means more and more offers that test the limits of their own bodily comfort and autonomy. 'Abuse Porn' is therefore somehow suggested as being the heart and soul of porn when it is allowed to reach it's natural limit, ie simulated rape. Not surprisingly the girls find it to be a step too far for their sensibilities to take. Quite right, I'd suggest, as the money to perform this stuff without having your 'heart in it' would never find a suitably high enough equation to deem it of any net benefit to my person-hood.

As many men will testify however, Porn is not a monolithic trove of played-out and video taped rape fantasies. It has thousands of strange, wonderful, tasteful, distasteful, Arty, disturbing and myriad permutations that bridge the full scope of the collective human desire for 'sex'. They do not ALL involve a form of quasi- consensual rape. Nor is 'Abuse Porn' as ubiquitous as this film suggests. Which leaves you wondering how 'neo-puritan' the film makers must be to be so naive about 'mens habits' as to paint it otherwise.

There are plenty of adult performers who are happy, well paid, professional, safe, intelligent, post-grad, up-standing citizens that chose Porn instead of a career in Science, for example, who DO NOT become the subject of porn documentaries. The film tries a little too hard to shame porn as an industry and in so doing, a lot of successful womens free choices to do something they love.

An average film which raises very important questions about female agency and male sexual desire.

I was interested in this after hearing that Rashida Jones (whom I've always liked) produced it.

The actual direction, honestly, is ho-hum-large parts of it felt like someone just strung a bunch of random footage together and called it a "documentary". This (imo) is the weak point of the movie.

Now, here's the part I found interesting: the central point of discussion was the exploding "amateur" porn market. Now, unless you're a complete simpleton, you understand that the people doing "amateur porn" are actually paid, and the doc details how these girls are found (the only thing I really found shocking was that people still use Craigslist).

The main producer (think his name is Riley) basically is these girls' pimp-he finds them, puts them up in his house, books their gigs and transports them. Whether he gets or expects sex from them is up for speculation. The focus is on fresh faces, and most of Riley's house-guests can expect a career of three months to a year before they either burn out or have to reinvent themselves.

I do think these kids are being exploited, and here's why: one of the girls reveals that the average payment per shoot is $800. I'm not a porn industry scholar, but I believe that a paid "professional" makes more in the range of $2k-$3k per shoot. Also, due to heavy regulation in California, most amateur porn is shot in Miami, which requires AIDS testing but no condoms. At the end of the movie, one of the girls reveals that they still have to pay for living expenses, all their clothes, make-up, lingerie, etc...she says that, over a 3-month period, she made $25k, and when she left the business, she had $2k left in the bank. The documentary doesn't reveal whether the girls pay Riley rent or not.

The main difference between Riley and a pimp is that he doesn't have to force girls to stay because there's a steady stream of new girls coming in the door.

Not the best documentary on the porn industry, but there are a few surprises.

If you are interested in who the girls are you skip threw tumblr, youporn, redtube and so on this could be interesting to watch. The documentary tells you a bit about the young girls that do porn and why they do it. I was not really shocked about the girls and their life, that was pretty much what i expected. Sometimes i felt sorry for the teens, sometimes not so much.

Summary:

You watch porn and want to know a bit more about the work behind the cam? Feel free to watch "hot girls wanted".

You are looking for some good, touching documentary? Skip it.

An eye-opening documentary which follows a girl and some of her co-workers just starting out in "the industry." Totally a must watch. I am almost tempted to watch the follow up to this but I honestly do want to see anymore. It is just to sad to watch these girls getting taken advantage of by these twisted people out to make cash at any cost. And apparently the average girl doesn't even last a year! So there will be a bunch of dirty videos of the poor girl up on the internet forever just because she was naive and did not know what she was getting into. Why hasn't anyone tried to regulate this industry yet? There are a zillion Bible-thumping congressmen and senators but not a single one is doing anything about this? I smell backroom deals and payoffs.

This is a good doc to watch. But with the producer growing up with privilege she didn't portray this very well. She made it out to be that these girls are so deprived and feel stuck that this was their easy outlet to a better life. No, these girls are from middle classed families not deprived. She makes is out to be industry is dangerous and wrong. But, by looking at it in this situation it isn't the case. These girls were there on their own free will. They have a roof over their heads and that scout books their gigs and goes with them to them. That scout does it in such a way that the girls are not forced into anything shady or put them in danger in anyway. If they want to leave or want out he lets them. These girls come to him not vise versa. So I didn't like how they were making it out to be that this industry is a bad situation. The material contradicts the theme of the Documentary. If you want to do a doc about this then use subject that fits your vision. Not the exact opposite.