'Scarlet Road'

• SXSW Film

  Daily reviews and interviews

• Hurts So Good

  BY MELANIE HAUPT

• From the Eyes of the Abused

  BY BELINDA ACOSTA

• 'Wonder Women!: The Untold Story of American Superheroines'

  BY ROBERT FAIRES

• 'The Do-Deca-Pentathlon'

  BY MELANIE HAUPT

• 'Kid-Thing'

  BY ASHLEY MORENO

• 'Brooklyn Castle'

  BY NORA ANKRUM

• 'Bad Brains: Band in DC'

  BY JOSH ROSENBLATT

• 'Small Apartments'

  BY JAMES RENOVITCH

• 'V/H/S'

  BY RICHARD WHITTAKER

• 'The Source'

  BY NORA ANKRUM

• 'Chasing Ice'

  BY NORA ANKRUM

• 'Sunset Strip'

  BY MARC SAVLOV

• 'Under African Skies'

  BY JOSH ROSENBLATT

• 'Funeral Kings'

  BY NORA ANKRUM

• 'Documentary Shorts 1'

  BY LEAH CHURNER

• 'Documentary Shorts 2'

  BY LEAH CHURNER

• 'Modus Anomali'

  BY RICHARD WHITTAKER

• 'Crazy Eyes'

  BY JAMES RENOVITCH

• 'Scarlet Road'

  BY KATE X MESSER

• 'Lost and Sound'

  BY WAYNE ALAN BRENNER

Scarlet Road

She hovers over his belly, smiling, then gently, almost imperceptibly, strokes his skin with her silken curtain of hair. Her hand guides his up and onto her, affording him the same pleasure, the affirming grace of human touch. Sex worker Rachel Wotton, who specializes in clients with disabilities, is on the job in New South Wales, where sex work was decriminalized, and this is her story. Director Catherine Scott lends a similarly deft and tender camera to the proceedings, not afraid to get in with close-ups, but perhaps not of what you think. While the film features two very intimate encounters, it never treads on the inappropriate or voyeuristic, instead capturing the subtle and everyday ("You can order in, like a pizza!") and emotionally nuanced ("I finally feel like a real bloke again!") with heightened sensitivity, offering the subtextual food for thought that for some, the world's oldest profession might very well be less an occupation than an avocation.

Friday, March 16, 11am, Alamo Lamar