LizFlix Reviews: The Happy Hooker: Portrait of a
Sexual Revolutionary (world premiere reviewed at the Philadelphia Independent Film Festival)
I knew very little about the history making “Happy
Hooker” before attending the 2008 Philadelphia
Independent Film Festival. “Xaviera Hollander” wasn’t
a household name in my family’s home, but to me its
lush syllables suggest the kind of exoticism meaning
“sex goddess” in any language. Xaviera Hollander: ‘The
Happy Hooker’: Portrait of a Sexual Revolutionary made
its world premier in the City of Brotherly Love. As I
sat, stuffed on a small loveseat, preparing for the
film’s debut, I though it very possible I would not
care for the documentary’s subject matter at all.
I was absolutely smitten by The Happy Hooker.
The film begins with a psychedelic montage of Xaviera
Hollander waving to fans and embracing her celebrity
status; in just seconds the movie’s tone turns much
more serious as Hollander narrates, in a style
reminiscent of poetry, her family’s history in the
Japanese concentration camps of World War II.
Hollander was released from the perils of torture and
starvation at the age of three; after explaining this,
the film documents her very early childhood before
jumping rather abruptly to the story of “Teenage
Lovers and Lesbians”, an account of Hollander’s
bi-curious adolescence. Though I wish Hollander had
spent a little more time talking about her transition
from a beautiful blonde little girl to a sexual siren,
I was never-the-less fascinated by what insightful,
articulate, introspective narrative she did offer up
about her budding sexuality. Most interesting were
Hollander’s notes on the old cliché that “women marry
men like their fathers.” According to Hollander, she
experienced he first orgasm on her father’s lap while
he spanked her for her teenaged indiscretion. Since
then, she explained, she has always fallen in love
with men who fulfilled that paternal image.
From there, the picture goes on to discuss Hollander’s
introduction to prostitution. According to her, a
friend suggested that she was sitting “on a gold mine”
sleeping with many men a week for free when her
irresistible charm could make her hobby a business.
From there, “the rest was history” and the film whips
back into the whirlwind of Hollander’s past and
present lives: her position as a pioneer for the
concept of “whore-pride”, her literary career, her
call girls’ encounters with clients such as Alfred
Hitchcock, her struggles with motherhood, and the
discovery of her eventual, everlasting love. Evenly
interspersed throughout the film are media clips of
notable television interviews between Hollander and
Larry King, as well as testaments to Hollander by some
of the country’s most renowned sexologists. With
respect to its variety of media, Happy Hooker is an
excellent composition.
Liz Licorish
LizFlix@ElitesTV.com
