“The Sales Girl” is the new effort from Mongolian director Janchivdorj Sengedorj, who has established himself as one of the most interesting talents of Mongolian film industry. Sengedorj has a magic touch with young people and not only in directing them but also in seeing through their eyes and telling their stories. In the urban setting of “The Sales Girl” too, there is a young woman learning to fly.
The Sales Girl is screening at Osaka Asian Film Festival
It all starts from a banana, coincidentally the more phallic fruit of all. When student Namuuna slips on a banana skin and breaks her leg, she is forced to find a temporary replacement for her afternoon job that requires a great deal of discretion. And who better than shy and loner fellow student Saruul (Bayartsetseg Bayangerel) can guarantee secrecy? It doesn't take long to convince Saruul that the money is good and the job is easy, despite being a bit out of the ordinary. In fact, the task consists in tending a Sex Shop, selling all sorts of oddly-shaped pleasure enhancers, making few occasional deliveries and, at the end of the day, going personally to hand over the day's earnings to Katya (Enkhtuul Oidovjamts), the shop owner, an eccentric middle-aged woman living with a cat in a sophisticated apartment.
Saruul starts working at the shop and, gradually, the routine meetings at the end of the shift bring the two women closer. They cannot be more different in age, experience and social league; one is from a modest family, the other leads a glamorous albeit solitary life. Saruul is fascinated by Katya, her mysterious past, her exotic Russian name and provenance; she is outspoken, daring, funny and sexually liberated, while Saruul is unexperienced, confused and doesn't even have the guts to tell her ambitious parents that she'd rather be a painter than the nuclear engineer they would like her to become. A sweet friendship blossoms while Saruul's adventure in the sex shop brings her in touch with worlds and situations she couldn't even imagine; sharing a prison cell with a bunch of prostitutes, being harassed by an old man, and most of all discovering her own sexuality and desires and challenging her fears.
In his 2017's “White Blessing', director Janchivdorj Sengedorj narrated the struggle of the protagonist Davaa, stubbornly pursuing her dream of becoming a judo champion. In “The Sales Girl”, city girl Saruul – same age but different personality – is stuck at the starting blocks, where she is still not sure “what” to pursue. The director/writer uses sex as a delicate metaphor for a path of the girl's self-discovery, and for a search and understanding of what really makes her tick. The film is rated 18 because of the Sex Shop antics and some (rather chaste, actually) nudity, but the director's gaze is delicate and never offensive. The mundanity of Saruul going around the house in underwear, using the toilet, exploring her morphing body in the mirror, is on point, spontaneous and real, and her attempt to explore a sexuality that doesn't belong to her, provides one of the funniest scenes of the movie. Even the brief harassment episode refrains from unnecessary visual explanations, still conveying very clearly the emotions.
At the end of the journey, Saruul is a different person, she has bloomed into a more self-aware and confident young woman. And Katya? Did Saruul imagine it all? Was she really a former Russian etoile? Did the Sex Shop ever exist? The film's uplifting finale leaves us with the slight feeling that it all might have been just a touch of magic. The kind of magic that happens when we grow up, all the set of necessary experiences we gain outside our family, outside our comfort zone and we treasure for life.
“The Sales Girl” is beautifully complemented by a score composed by Dulguun Bayasgalan and performed with his group Magnolian, an indie band popular amongst Mongolian youth population, and featured while playing in person in the movie. Rather than being just a background music, we hear the music through Sarauul's always-on headphones, accompanying and highlighting her own dreamy world, her personal space. In fact, interestingly, the music here seems to serve the purpose of defining a precise area of age and time. The Magnolian delineates Saruul's digital cloud and age group, while Katya's space is marked by her collection of vinyl records. We can spot jazz, Etta James, Pink Floyd's “Atom Heart Mother”, but her most precious possession is the Pink Floyd's legendary album “The Dark Side of The Moon”. She prompts Saruul to close her eyes and smell it. “Doesn't it smell like the 70's?” she asks her, but the girl doesn't know what the 70's smelt like. On the other hand, at Saruul's less glamorous parents' home, the radio blurts out the familiar sound of the Soyol Erdene, the first rock band of Mongolia.
The camerawork, in conjunction with the director's rather delicate framing, create some memorable and poetic flights of fancy. In one scene, Saruul's arms stick out of the bathtub, and she plays creating birds with her hands and childish fingers. In another, she is in an empty bus at night and sings along the tune in her headphone; someone in a back sit starts to sing with her, he's the singer/composer of the Magnolian and the bus turns into a cool music venue.
Bayartsetseg Bayangerel in her very first acting role as Saruul is just perfect. She epitomises with grace that crucial and rather confusing time of sitting at the cusp between adolescence and womanhood, swaying from playing like a child, and recognising her own dreams and impulses. Her counterpart Enkhtuul Oidovjamts, in the enigmatic role of Katya, shows her talent and years of experience as a popular theatrical actress giving her character several layers and great depth. The two women's chemistry on screen is tangible and keeps together the dramatic context.
All in all, “The Sales Girl” confirms once again that director Janchivdorj Sengedorj is one of the best voices of contemporary cinema in Mongolia, and it's a voice that should deserve to travel outside the festival circuit.
