Maggie’s grandson is seriously ill and the medication to save him is way beyond what his parents can afford. Desperate, the middle-class Londoner finds herself responding to a lucrative job offer at a sex club. The shy widow meets the club’s manager, who introduces her to her tasks as a “hostess”.

Five decades after her memorable appearance in Jean-Luc Godard’s Made in U.S.A., musician Marianne Faithful returns to the screen again in Sam Garbarski’s comedic Berlinale competitor Irina Palm—starring here as a widowed sex worker in London’s red-light district. A fascinating character study.