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The Oldest Profession

Directed by Noboru Tanaka
Film Movement Classics
1974
83 Minutes
Japan
Japanese
Classics, Drama
Sex & Sexuality, Asian Studies, Film Studies
Not Rated
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19-year-old Tome is a sex worker who draws in customers around the red-light district of Osaka. She lives with her mentally disabled younger brother, Saneo, and her mother, Yone, who is also still active as a sex worker despite being over 40 years old. One day, after receiving a request for a young girl, Tome goes to the designated inn. On arrival she encounters Yone, who is unable to find work. A few days later, Yone tells Tome that she is pregnant...

20 years have passed since the Prostitution Prevention Law was enacted, and the red-light district is now gone. Nonetheless, sex work as a profession persists. Noboru Tanaka's controversial film (also known as "Lusty Beast Market") portrays sorrowful but strong and resilient women who have no other choice but to earn a living by selling their bodies.

Restored in 4K from the 35mm master negative in 2021 by NIKKATSU Corporation at Cineric in New York and Lisbon.

Cast

  • Meika Seri
  • Junko Miyashita
  • Genshû Hanayagi
  • Moeko Ezawa
  • Shiro Yumemura
  • Highest Rating
    "Tanaka’s masterpiece, which departs even more forcefully from the impositions of the ‘Roman porno’ genre (erotic-themed films strictly codified in Japan), to build a desert film of bodies, of a void of desire (desire experienced as a desert), of erotic minimalism exhibited within the dynamics of economic need."
    Fuori orario
  • Highest Rating
    "An intriguing mix of social critique and carnal gratification."
    Peter Joseph Head, Japanoscope
  • Highest Rating
    "Probably the source of one of the most characteristic images of Roman Porno, “The Oldest Profession (aka Confidential Report: Sex Market or Secret Chronicle: She Beast Market), is among the most distinctive titles of the category...a very entertaining and artful movie...."
    Panos Kotzathanasis, Asian Movie Pulse
  • Highest Rating
    "Noboru Tanaka (born in 1937) is the most direct heir to Imamura, and the most personal author of roman-porno understood as an expression of liberatory sex within a popular tradition of Japan. An intellectual director, and the most refined of his colleagues, he gave true formal existence to his films […]. Filmed in the poorest districts of Osaka, it is rather typical of his realistic-fantastic style.... Superb."
    Max Tessier

Gallery

Awards & Recognition

Official Selection
Venice Film Festival
Official Selection
New York Film Festival
Official Selection
Hong Kong Asian Film Festival
Official Selection
Thessaloniki Int'l. Film Festival
Official Selection
Camera Japan