Sex work is one of the world’s oldest professions. However, it remains one of the most denigrated ones as well. There are countless misconceptions about the job and the people who earn their living eth the trade. However, it often feels as if these false impressions are designed to dismiss and permit the mistreatment of workers. There’s a general belief that there must be something wrong with anyone willing to engage in sex work, but people are dispelling those erroneous beliefs. In Modern Whore, women speak openly about their experiences in the industry, describing the good, the bad, and the ugly.
The documentary is a feature-length expansion of a short film by director Nicole Bazuin and subject and co-writer Andrea Werhun, as well as their book of the same name. It’s a lively and frank discussion about Werhun’s experience as an escort and exotic dancer.
Werhun recounts the unsophisticated process of choosing an escort agency while in university in Toronto. Werhun talks about her her days on the job from her first client to her umpteenth one. She describes her respectful regulars and men who thought they paid to hurt or humiliate her. Werhun’s transition to exotic dancing seemed logical and the clever use of a loophole in an agreement with her mother. But in spite of the seemingly more controlled environment, it was not always safer.
Werhun explains that one of the reasons she enjoyed being an escort was a love of performance and storytelling. She could pretend to be someone else when entertaining clients, having no obligation to share anything real about herself.
Werhun applies her fondness for acting by starring in the film’s re-enactments of her stories. She plays herself, but also the personification of the shame that society expects her to carry. The recreations are highly stylistic, adding another level of engagement to the already engrossing narrative. The picture also uses animations to illustrate some of Werhun’s more abstract notions–or anecdotes that can’t be put to film simply by their nature.
Through Werhun’s personal accounts and interviews with her industry friends, the documentary sets out to refute some of the many assumptions and misconceptions about sex workers. She gives a platform to views beyond her own, illuminating the additional issues women endure, which are often compounded by factors like race and gender identity. Werhun points out that fiction almost always portrays sex workers as victims or villains. She wants to show they’re just people performing a service.
More importantly, the film demonstrates the dangers sex workers face because the profession is illegal and unregulated. They work for people who lie to them, distort the truth, and/or fail to protect them. Clients feel they can get away with harming workers because they can’t file a police report without implicating themselves. It also contributes to the stigma that sex workers are bad people since they are committing a crime.
The documentary is a passionate summation of Werhun’s advocacy work. It thoroughly explores sex work in a way that validates the community, while not ignoring the challenges they face.
Modern Whore screened as part of the 2025 Toronto International Film Festival. Head here to get all our That Shelf TIFF coverage.
