The Sales Girl, the review: sexual and sentimental education at the sex shop

Our first (half) disappointment at the Far East Film Festival 2023 is The Sales Girl by Sengedorj Janchivdorj, one of the two Mongolian titles in competition. A (tragic) comedy that would like to be irreverent and witty thanks to the taboo subject it stages, but gets lost in some philosophical attempts.

There is also some (half) disappointment at Far East Film Festival 2023 (at least for the writer). And it comes from one of the titles presented at the press conference that most intrigued us for the topic brought to the stage. As we will explain in the review of The Sales Girlit is a Mongolian comedy (two titles from Mongolia which this year returns for the second year in selection at the Festival) which bears the signature of director Sengedorj Janchivdorj, who for his ninth film chooses to explore the taboos and prejudices about sex shops by telling the story of an apparently shy girl who works there, the over the top owner and her customers.

A (a)typical (tragi)sexy comedy

The tone of The Sales Girl Sengedorj Janchivdorj he establishes this almost immediately from the first scene, or so he wishes. In fact, he starts off with a fixed shot from a distance of a banana peel that falls on the street and then on various passers-by who take turns on that street. Sooner or later someone will stumble upon a fruit which, by conformation, has a phallic shape, not by chance. At that point, due to a series of (un)fortunate events, the protagonist of the film gets the job as a saleswoman at the illegal sex shop, looked after by a strange woman with a half-Russian accent who in the evening expects the girl to go to her to bring her the ‘cash in… and some cat food. Thus begins for the girl a kind of double life, hidden from parents and classmates, and sort of sentimental and sexual education, which comes as much from the aforementioned owner as from more or less regular patrons or simply intrigued by the shop under the stairs passing down the street. This part of the story, deliberately irreverent and outspoken, wants to definitively put a point on the taboo on sex, which should no longer exist. He succeeds and gives the film a playful but no less attentive and shrewd tone.

A weird (tragi)philosophical comedy

Where, on the other hand, the film loses its edge is in necessarily wanting to insert a whole philosophical and existential part into the narrative fabric role of sex in the characters’ daily lives. It could have worked if there had been a balance in the tone of the story, mediated between the more comical part and the more serious and reflective one, but unfortunately this does not happen and the result is a film with an ups and downs. Even the staging reflects this unbalanced approach at the screenplay level: the direction alternates moments of medium and full shots, which would like to give a more authorial approach to the film, with others more focused on close-ups and details, to try to enter the psychology of the characters, which however risks creating a short circuit before reaching the spectators. As well as photography that plays with neon lights that recall the sex shop and also something secret and murky, while wanting to reveal exactly the opposite message.

A sexual bildungsroman

At the same time we are witnessing a real bildungsroman and sexual of the protagonist, who creates a double equal and opposite with the owner, a woman who seems to have lived a thousand lives and have as many scars left from these existences. Thus a sort of unhealthy and anomalous mother-daughter relationship is created which will lead to disconcerting revelations between the two about their respective pasts. Basically, the film is a sort of liberation therapy for a young girl who has her whole life ahead of her and perhaps is in too much of a hurry to live it and discover it, and on the other hand the awareness of a lived lady full of experiences ready to share them with the new generation to pass the baton and not make the same mistakes as them. You only live once and it’s good not to let too much remorse and too much pain along the way, The Sales Girl seems to tell us this, especially since karma works in mysterious ways. It’s a pity she didn’t do it with greater poise and conviction.