Heading South is a 2005 French-Canadian-Belgian drama film directed by Laurent Cantet and based on three short stories by Dany Laferrière. It depicts the experiences of three middle-aged white women in the late 1970s, travelling to Haiti for the purposes of sexual tourism with young men. Their adventures (as seen in their eyes) are juxtaposed with class issues and the deteriorating political climate of Haiti at the time of Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier. The women demonstrate different attitudes to the complex situation.

Plot

Ellen (Charlotte Rampling), is a professor of French literature at Wellesley College in Boston who has spent six summers at a Haitian resort where local young men and teenagers providing sexual companionship are easy to find. Among other guests, Brenda (Karen Young), a stay-at-home wife from Savannah, Georgia, and Sue (Louise Portal), a warehouse manager from Montreal, feel lonely and ignored by middle-aged men back at home. They travelled to Haiti to enjoy a holiday of sun, surf, and sex with attractive teenagers to whom they are financially generous; complicating their friendship is the fact that Ellen and Brenda both live for the attention of Legba (Ménothy César). It is only after an episode of violence disrupts their vacation that their eyes are finally opened to the callousness of their hedonistic actions, the suffering of the Haitian people and the political climate.