The dawn of the 20th century: L’Apollonide, a luxurious and traditional brothel in Paris, is living its last days. In this closed world, where some men fall in love and others become viciously harmful, the women share their secrets, their fears, their joys and their pains.

Set in 1920s Shanghai, Ma Zouri and Xiang Feitian establish a notorious beauty pageant called the Flowers Competition. All of the city's elite attend the gala event, but when Wanyan Ying unexpectedly wins, it sets into motion a series of tragic events that change their destinies.

A submissive hooker goes about her trade, suffering abuse at the hands of Japanese salarymen and Yakuza types. She's unhappy about her work, and is apparently trying to find some sort of appeasement for the fact that her lover has married.

A girl named O loves a rich, and much older man. She is subjected to a variety of humiliating experiences to prove her unconditional obedience to him in a Chinese brothel. A poor boy sees her and falls in love with her. To get the money needed to sleep with her, he takes part in rebellious acts.

During World War II, a secret agent must seduce and assassinate an official who works for the Japanese puppet government in Shanghai.

A Westerner finds refuge with a group of women in a church during Japan's rape of Nanking in 1937. Posing as a priest, he attempts to lead the women to safety.

The lives of five sex workers employed at a Japanese brothel while the nation is debating the passage of an anti-prostitution law.

Shanghai, China, 1930. When young Shuisheng arrives from the countryside, his uncle Liushu puts him at the service of Bijou, the mistress of Laoda, supreme boss of the Tang Triad, constantly threatened by his enemies, both those he knows and those lurking in the shadows.

A story set in 19th century China and centered on the lifelong friendship between two girls who develop their own secret code as a way to contend with the rigid cultural norms imposed on women.

Anna Tsuchiya blasts back in time playing an oiran, a top-notched geisha of the Edo period’s Yoshiwara District, navigating brothel politics while trying to cling to the man she loves.

At the house of a famous Chinese botanist teacher his daughter and a female intern fall in love with each other - a forbidden love that must be kept secret.

In an early 20th century village, a painter with an unusual commission finds two pretty girls two model for him. The girls slowly come of age while exploring their sexuality and finding liberation in a repressed society.

A pig farmer, a busboy, a salon owner, an expat architect and a jaded rich girl cross paths as thousands of dead pigs float down the Yangtze River toward Shanghai.

The wealthy president of a company has built up an unpayable debt to a local crime lord, and to escape punishment he sells his famous dancer wife to the lecherous old man figuring a 90 year old can’t do too much bad with her. Perhaps not, but others can while he watches. She’s put on stage in an underground BDSM sex show and begins a spiraling decent from strongly independent woman to submissive sex slave

In the late 19th century, a chambermaid from Paris relocates to a remote household in Provence, engages in trysts and finds herself enraptured with a coach driver.

Liam Liu unwittingly gets involved with a high school girl. He suddenly has to go to China after learning from his father that he has inherited his grandmother's home in Shanghai. He's not very appreciative of his Chinese roots, and at first, only wants to sell the house and get back to the U.S. as fast as possible. He gets a taste of the Chinese culture and ends up having some big decisions to make.

1965, Dominican Republic. At a seaside brothel, the lives of a group of prostitutes take a dramatic turn when freedom fighters stage a revolutionary coup, making them realise they can have a better life and perhaps find love. But everything changes when the US army supresses the revolution and takes the brothel as a military base: the girls will have to face the dilemma of either sleeping with the enemy or protecting their dignity at all costs.

Jack Flowers is an American hustler trying to make his fortune in 1970s Singapore in small time pimping. His dreams of building a fortune by running a brothel himself and returning to the States is materialized when he is offered the opportunity by the CIA to run a brothel for the R&R activities of U.S. soldiers on leave in Singapore.

Emma, a French novelist aged 27, decide to go to Berlin and join a brothel to uncover the prostitution world, the subject of her new book. Such as gonzo journalism, Emma become a prostitute and her experience, which was supposed to last a few weeks, will last two years. Was writing her book an excuse for Emma to live a shameful fantasy?

Two boys meet at an opera training school in Peking in 1924. Their resulting friendship will span nearly 70 years and endure some of the most troublesome times in China's history.

An American man returns to a corrupt, Japanese-occupied Shanghai four months before Pearl Harbor and discovers his friend has been killed. While he unravels the mysteries of the death, he falls in love and discovers a much larger secret that his own government is hiding.

Golden Lotus is based, in part, on Jin Ping Mei, a famous erotic novel of ancient China. Li Han-Hsiang adapted part of the story into this film, which starts with Hsi Men Ching, a successful merchant, wooing Pan Chin Lien, the beautiful wife of one of the townspeople.

The classic story of Emma Bovary, the beautiful wife of a small-town doctor in 19th century France, who engages in extra marital affairs in an attempt to advance her social status.

This melodrama investigates the life of a sex worker, in a pseudo-documentary style.

In a small Japanese village at the end of the 19th century, a rickshaw driver's wife takes on a much younger lover and the two conspire to murder him.

Beautiful young housewife Séverine Serizy cannot reconcile her masochistic fantasies with her everyday life alongside dutiful husband Pierre. When her lovestruck friend Henri mentions a secretive high-class brothel run by Madame Anais, Séverine begins to work there during the day under the name Belle de Jour. But when one of her clients grows possessive, she must try to go back to her normal life.

Residents of a rundown boardinghouse in 19th-century Japan, including a mysterious old man and an aging actor, get drawn into a love triangle that turns violent. When amoral thief Sutekichi breaks off his affair with landlady Osugi to romance her younger sister, Okayo, Osugi extracts her revenge by revealing her infidelity to her jealous husband.

Bored with the limited and tedious nature of provincial life in 19th-century France, the fierce and sensual Emma Bovary finds herself in calamitous debt and pursues scandalous sexual liaisons with absolute abandon. However, when her volatile lifestyle catches up to her, the lives of everyone around her are endangered.

In 1913 Beijing, three fierce women—disguised rebel Tsao Wan, jewel-seeking Sheung Hung, and opera heiress Pat Neil—embark on a daring quest filled with intrigue and betrayal, challenging societal norms amidst political turmoil and the vibrant world of Peking Opera.

Paris, the late 1960s. Madame Claude is at the head of a flourishing business dedicated to prostitution that gives her power over both the French political and criminal worlds. But the end of her empire is closer than she thinks.

Mimma starts working in Madame Colette’s brothel to help her boyfriend financially. There she is rechristened “Paprika,” and falls in love with her first client, naval officer Franco. Despite this attraction, she begins her climb through the sex trade, residing in Italy’s most illustrious brothels.

A woman, Tome, is born to a lower class family in Japan in 1918. The title refers to an insect, repeating its mistakes, as in an infinite circle. Imamura, with this metaphor, introduces the life of Tome, who keeps trying to change her poor life.

Olivier Assayas, Gus Van Sant, Wes Craven and Alfonso Cuaron are among the 20 distinguished directors who contribute to this collection of 18 stories, each exploring a different aspect of Parisian life. The colourful characters in this drama include a pair of mimes, a husband trying to chose between his wife and his lover, and a married man who turns to a prostitute for advice.

Though only 14 years old, May is selected to be the third wife of a wealthy landowner. Her new home seems idyllic, her husband favours her, and she quickly becomes pregnant with what she is certain will be the desired male progeny. But trouble is quietly brewing: she witnesses a forbidden tryst that will spark a chain reaction of misfortunes — and stir in May urges that until now had been dormant.

Shanghai gangsters grapple with lust and loyalty on the eve of war with Japan as they try to navigate an alliance with the enemy's army.

A look at modern-day life in China's capital centered on a ménage-a-quatre involving a young woman, her boss, her husband and her boss's wife.

In the years before World War II, a penniless Japanese child is torn from her family to work as a maid in a geisha house.

Amid the opulent teahouses of 1930s Hong Kong, a humble courtesan and the wayward scion of a wealthy family fall in love and embrace death by suicide pact. Fifty years later, her ghost returns to find him, drawing a young contemporary couple into her quest to rekindle a passion that may be as illusory as time itself.

Successful and married with children, paper-mill owner Jihei knows better than to contradict the strict social and moral codes of 18th-century Japan. But when he meets the lovely courtesan Koharu, he becomes a man obsessed. Koharu returns his love, even foregoing other customers while Jihei schemes to somehow buy her freedom. His efforts yield ruinous consequences for his business and his family life, and Koharu is meanwhile purchased by another client.

Glendon Wasey is a fortune hunter looking for a fast track out of China. Gloria Tatlock is a missionary nurse seeking the curing powers of opium for her patients. Fate sets them on a hectic, exotic, and even romantic quest for stolen drugs. But they are up against every thug and smuggler in Shangai.

A love story between a country boy in Beijing to study and a wealthy businessman set against the backdrop of the 1989 Tiananmen Square incident.

Set in late 19th century Canton, this martial arts film depicts the stance taken by the legendary martial arts hero Wong Fei-Hung against foreign forces' plundering of China.

A chronicle of the life of a middle-class French girl's sexual adventures, her then fall into prostitution, and her ultimate redemption.

In 1930s Shanghai, 'The White Countess' is both Sofia, a fallen member of the exiled Russian aristocracy, and a nightclub created by a blind American diplomat who asks Sofia to be the centerpiece of the world he wants to create.

In early 19th century England, ambitious and ruthless orphan Rebecca Sharp advances from the position of governess to the heights of British society.

Émilie meets Camille who is attracted to Nora, who crosses paths with Amber. Three girls and a boy – They're friends, sometimes lovers and often both.

The lives of three strong-willed women and a young musician cross paths in Tehran’s schizophrenic society where sex, adultery, corruption, prostitution and drugs coexist with strict religious law. In this bustling modern metropolis, avoiding prohibition has become an everyday sport and breaking taboos can be a means of personal emancipation.

A woman from the country moves into to the big city of Buenos Aires to start a new life. Things are not going very easy and she soon finds herself working as a prostitute.

A corrupt local official, Xi Men Qing, who lusts after women and money, pursues his brother's young wife, Lee Ping Er. Ping finds Men attractive, and under her drunken husband's nose, she and Men work their way through the illustrations of a pillow book, the "Golden Lotus." Men pursues the same feat with his fourth concubine, Pan Jing Lien, who lives in the compound next to Ping. Jing's jealousy compounds a tale of humiliation, childbirth, death, and depravity. Does karma or enlightenment await anyone?

In early 20th century New York City, an impoverished socialite desperately seeks a suitable husband as she gradually finds herself betrayed by her friends and exiled from high society.

Four independent stories set in modern China about random acts of violence.

In 1962 Hong Kong, neighbors Su Li-zhen (Mrs. Chan) and Chow Mo-wan (Mr. Chow) discover their spouses are having an affair. As they spend time together, they develop feelings for each other, but their relationship remains chaste and unspoken, reflecting societal constraints and their own moral compass.

Jérôme Varenne, a French financier, lives and works in Shanghai with Chen-Li, his life and business partner. One day, during a short stay in Paris, while paying a call to his mother, he is very displeased to learn from her and his hated brother, that the family house in Ambray is going to be sold. Jerome decides to go to the town where he grew up to see what is going on. Little does he know how eventful his escapade will be. Little does he know that it will change his life from soup to nuts...

Film director Wai asks gang leader Ball to invest in a movie. He cheats famous actors Lok and Sa Sa to take the classical film, and then he finds two stunt actors, April and KK, for the love scene. With the editing, he changes the film with famous actors acting erotic movie. Everything is smooth, but Ball comes up and asks for “special service” from April in exchange for his continued investment in the movie…

Based on a novel by the same name written by Gu Hua, a melodrama about the life and travails of a young woman who lives through the turmoil of the Cultural Revolution.

A young scholar named Yangsheng who gets married to the beautiful daughter of a local merchant. When their sex life proves unsatisfactory, Yangsheng leaves home and journeys to the Pavilion of Ultimate Bliss.

Secrets, rumors and betrayals surround the upcoming marriage between a young dissolute man and virtuous woman of the French aristocracy.

In the suburbs of Rome two very different souls intersect. One is the son of a restaurant owner who disappeared with his lover. The other is a young mysterious woman who has arrived from China in search of her missing sister.

In 1920s China, 19-year-old Songlian becomes a concubine of a powerful lord and is forced to compete with his three wives for the privileges gained.

Two disaffected, unemployed Chinese youth drift through life on the streets of their industrial town, their paths crossing with that of a local young singer and dancer working for a liquor company as a spokesmodel.

Albert Nobbs struggles to survive in late 19th century Ireland, where women aren't encouraged to be independent. Posing as a man, so she can work as a butler in Dublin's most posh hotel, Albert meets a handsome painter and looks to escape the lie she has been living.

In Edo Period Japan, a noblewoman's banishment for her love affair with a lowly page signals the beginning of her inexorable fall.

Three generations of a wealthy Bordeaux family are caught in the crossfire when Anne decides to run for mayor, thanks to a political pamphlet that revives an old murder scandal.

In 1960s Tokyo, Gonda owns a bar in which the gay, cross-dresser, and trans scenes meet. Gonda is in a relationship with the madam of the bar, Leda. As the younger Eddie starts a passionate affair with Gonda, she ignites the jealousy of Leda, unaware of another kind of history between them.

A woman with a body writing fetish seeks to find a combined lover and calligrapher.

Top Nazi officials, intent on rooting out traitors and those in the military who may be plotting to overthrow Adolf Hitler, recruit and train a group of beautiful prostitutes whose mission is to use any means necessary to uncover plots against the Fuhrer.

Pomme is a meek and mild French beautician whose life takes a fateful turn during a vacation to Normandy. She becomes the lover of middle-class literature-student François. The relationship sours when François takes her home to meet his parents, thanks in no small part to their differing social backgrounds.

Vicky recalls her romances with her exes Hao Hao and Jack in the neon-lit clubs of Taipei.

A gangster gets released from prison and has to cope with the recent shifts of power between the gangs, while taking care of a thrill-seeking young woman, who got in bad company while gambling.

In a Tokyo love hotel district, a woman is found dead in a derelict apartment. As police investigate, a romance novelist's wife lives a life that seems simply a daily repetition without romance. To break away from the loveless monotony, she follows her desires and becomes a nude model enacting sex in front of a camera. Soon, she meets a mentor and begins selling her body to strangers, while at home, she hides behind the façade that she's still the doting wife she's supposed to be.

French silkworm trader Hervé is married to the beautiful Hélène. When an outbreak of disease ravages European silkworms, Hervé must travel to Japan to retrieve healthy eggs. After a long journey, Hervé finally arrives at a village where he can buy them. He becomes infatuated with a young concubine and goes to great lengths to see her again. But, when war breaks out in Japan, the concubine flees, forcing Hervé to return home to his wife.

Housemaid Georgette loves to gossip and this causes major trouble to people around her.

Two doctors in Victorian England use manual stimulation of female genitalia to cure their patients' ills, leading to the invention of the vibrator.

In 9th century China, a corrupt government wages war against a rebel army called the Flying Daggers. A romantic warrior breaks a beautiful rebel out of prison to help her rejoin her fellows, but things are not what they seem.

On the beaches of Kenya they’re known as "Sugar Mamas" —European women who seek out African boys selling love to earn a living. Teresa, a 50-year-old Austrian and mother of a daughter entering puberty, travels to this vacation paradise, moving from beach to beach.

Two warriors in pursuit of a stolen sword and a notorious fugitive are led to an impetuous, physically-skilled, teenage nobleman's daughter, who is at a crossroads in her life.

It's the 1940s, and the notorious Axe Gang terrorizes Shanghai. Small-time criminals Sing and Bone hope to join, but they only manage to make lots of very dangerous enemies. Fortunately for them, kung fu masters and hidden strength can be found in unlikely places. Now they just have to take on the entire Axe Gang.

A corrupt magistrate subjects a innocent young bride to inconceivable physical punishments after convicting her of killing her husband.

Fresh to Las Vegas with no connections, Nomi Malone takes a job as an exotic dancer. Her talents are quickly noticed by Cristal, a headlining dancer who senses an opportunity to bolster her own act. But Nomi won’t play second fiddle and soon begins her venomous path to the top, ruthlessly backstabbing anyone who gets in her way.

When a brothel closes because of new laws, four of the prostitutes decide to go into business running a restaurant. They discover they cannot escape their past.

Michalina Wislocka, the most famous and recognized sexologist of communist Poland, fights for the right to publish her book, which will change the sex life of Polish people forever.

After a bleak childhood, Jane Eyre goes out into the world to become a governess. As she lives happily in her new position at Thornfield Hall, she meets the dark, cold, and abrupt master of the house, Mr. Rochester. Jane and her employer grow close in friendship and she soon finds herself falling in love with him. Happiness seems to have found Jane at last, but could Mr. Rochester's terrible secret be about to destroy it forever?

China’s rapid changes from the late 1970s to the early 1990s, as seen through the lives of four performers in a theater troupe.

A passionate love story set against a backdrop of sexual freedom, loosely based on the relationship between 19th century authors Pierre Louÿs and Marie de Régnier.

Teenage lovers Tony and Tyan-Hwa tip the balance of power in New York's Little Italy and Chinatown.

Ouyang Feng is a heartbroken and cynical man who spends his days in the desert, connecting expert swordsmen with those seeking revenge and willing to pay for it. Throughout five seasons in exile, Ouyang spins tales of his clients' unrequited loves and unusual acts of bravery.

Nick Carraway, a young Midwesterner now living on Long Island, finds himself fascinated by the mysterious past and lavish lifestyle of his neighbor, the nouveau riche Jay Gatsby. He is drawn into Gatsby's circle, becoming a witness to obsession and tragedy.

Jack is an internet gambler living in NYC. After the death of his roommate, he becomes fixated on Scarlet - a cam girl from San Francisco. His obsession reaches a boiling point when fantasy materializes in reality and Jack sees Scarlet on a rainy NYC Chinatown street.

The story of Hong Kong, from New Year's Day to June 30th, 1997, when the British left their colony and turned it over to the People's Republic of China.

Ane is in her mid-forties and delighted when a stunning bouquet of flowers is delivered to her home. But the site manager has no idea who to thank – one thing is for sure; her jealous husband, Ander, is not the unknown cavalier. As these gallantries increase, always on a Thursday and always with an anonymous sender, Ane’s life takes on a new direction. The life of Lourdes is also sent into turmoil by beautiful bouquets of flowers: Since the death of her husband in a traffic accident, flowers have been deposited regularly at the scene. Lourdes’ mother-in-law, Tere, is determined to get to the bottom of the anonymous flowers. Jon Garaño and José Mari Goenaga’s feature film debut pays charming homage to three headstrong women and the power of flowers.

A passionate telling of the story of Sada Abe, a woman whose affair with her master led to an obsessive and ultimately destructive sexual relationship.

A British medical doctor fights a cholera outbreak in a small Chinese village, while also being trapped at home in a loveless marriage to an unfaithful wife.

Anna Karenina, the wife of a Russian imperial minister, creates a high-society scandal by an affair with Count Vronsky, a dashing cavalry officer in 19th-century St. Petersburg.

During China's Tang dynasty the emperor has taken the princess of a neighboring province as his wife. She has borne him two sons and raised his eldest. Now his control over his dominion is complete, including the royal family itself.

The elderly Shukishi and his wife, Tomi, take the long journey from their small seaside village to visit their adult children in Tokyo. Their elder son, Koichi, a doctor, and their daughter, Shige, a hairdresser, don't have much time to spend with their aged parents, and so it falls to Noriko, the widow of their younger son who was killed in the war, to keep her in-laws company.

In the shady black markets and bombed-out hovels of post–World War II Tokyo, a tough band of prostitutes eke out a dog-eat-dog existence, maintaining tenuous friendships and a semblance of order in a world of chaos. But when a renegade ex-soldier stumbles into their midst, lusts and loyalties clash, with tragic results. With Gate of Flesh, visionary director Seijun Suzuki delivers a whirlwind of social critique and pulp drama, shot through with brilliant colors and raw emotions.

Two young women find themselves struggling to survive in Paris, street-wise Nathalie, a stripper, and naïve Sandrine, a barmaid. Together, they discover that sex can be used to their advantage, and pleasure.

In 19th century New York high society, a young lawyer falls in love with a woman separated from her husband, while he is engaged to the woman's cousin.

A young Vietnamese peasant girl named Mùi becomes the servant of a house in pre-unification Saigon.