What makes it different from others?

Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

Absolutely amazing

If you like to be scared, if you like to laugh, and if you like to learn a thing or two at the movies, this absolutely cannot be missed.

Three middle-aged women that have boring lives travel to the Hotel Petite Anse, in Port Prince, Haiti, to have good-time with sex and beach. Brenda (Karen Young), from Savannah, Georgia, has left her husband and returned to the hotel seeking out the local gigolo Legba (Ménothy Cesar), a young man with a sculptural body that gave her first orgasm three years ago. However, she finds that Legba is "dating" the lonely Ellen (Charlotte Rampling), a literature teacher from Boston. Ellen introduces the frustrated Canadian Sue (Louise Portal) that works in Montreal in the storage department of a factory to Brenda, and disputes with the new acquaintance the sexual favors of Legba. However, the youngster has a serious problem and is hunted by a violent man.The deceptive "Vers le Sud" is a boring and overrated soap-opera that goes nowhere. Despite the theme, the director does not dare and makes a conventional movie with no eroticism or sexual tension among the characters that are shallow and uninteresting. Charlotte Rampling is still a beautiful woman but the scene where she mentions that she is fifty-five years old is absolutely unnecessary since she was almost sixty in 2005. My vote is three.Title (Brazil) "Em Direção ao Sul" ("In the Direction of South")

spoilersWe are at a small Haitian beach resort in the 1970s, which is frequented by North American, middle-aged, single women looking for readily available Haitian boy-toys, cheap and attentive, to enliven their vacation. Two women from the U.S., Ellen and Brenda, meet and become casual friends in the bonne homme of a small resort, but their friendship is soon strained to mere politeness as they find themselves competing for the attention of the same beautiful, young man, Legba, with whom they are both infatuated. There are scenes of genuine eroticism and sensuality between the young man and the two women, but what seems lost on both women as they allow their competition to escalate their attachment, is that neither is of significant interest to Legba. He is a seasonal worker, like roofers and house painters back home; his trade happens to be gigolo during the tourist season. When the season is over, he has his normal life with a mother struggling to make ends meet, a girl-friend, and the pervasive strong-arm government corruption that haunts the lives of the island country. As the women increasing fling themselves, money, and other enticements at Legba's feet, it does not occur to them that he is not in love, nor in danger of falling in love with them, which makes their passion all the more poignant and pathetic.An interesting point is made as the 3 leading women are having a frank, after dinner discussion about the fun of having boy-toys at the disposal, summed up with the statement, " …the difference is that the white men our age back home aren't really horny." This was met with knowing grins and chuckles. The ironic point is that you can be sure at tables of other sex-tourism locations, men are having after dinner conversations agreeing that… the difference is that the white women our age back home aren't really horny. I find this film difficult to peg as it doesn't fit the usual genres: drama, romance or sex-comedy. 2 days reflection later I added this:Heading South may be a problem for some viewers, it was for me; of the type, not seeing the forest for the trees— because I forgot what frames all. The film opens to an earnest, middle-aged Haitian woman offering her teenage daughter to a stranger she thinks is leaving the country, because she believes it is only a matter of time before the girl will be kidnapped, raped and murdered by one of the bands of thugs which the Haitian government used to help rule the country by terror. This mother figures her daughter has a better chance surviving with a nice looking stranger in another country, than staying with her own mother in violent and corrupt Haiti. Then near the end of the film we see the bodies of two Haitian dumped on the beach at night because they had offended some government sponsored thug of one of the death squads. When focused through these two horrific lens, the middle-aged, middle class ennui of three vacationing white women, so absorbing to them, becomes pathetically self-indulgent, as they use their petty cash unthinking to add yet another exploitation on the poor 3rd world people who work at the resort.

"Older women are best, because they always think they may be doing it for the last time." Ian Fleming Women in love . . . or lust . . . or longing. Heading South, set in Haiti in the '70's, is paradise for needy but wealthy middle-aged women. Young black men are willing to share their love for either dollars or gifts, while the women get something they can't buy elsewhere: respect and orgasms. It all seems much purer than men seeking young girls in Thailand, yet there is usually trouble in paradise.Three intertwining stories are told into camera of Ellen (Charlotte Rampling), who regularly comes here and has become attached to young Legba (Menothy Cesar); Brenda (Karen Young), who came once before with her husband and now threatens to steal Legba from Ellen; and Sue, an overweight, brassy Canadian. Nothing much happens but some petty jealousiesover Legba, until director Cantet goes outside the circle of thismodest resort where Papa Doc's dictatorship touches quietly on theirlives. In fact, the most powerful part of the film occurs in the opening scene, where a black mother tries to give away her daughter to a prosperous black man in order to avoid the child's being taken from her, as often happens to poor blacks in Haiti.Although a couple of the black men are filmed naked, and Brenda's breasts are revealed after a shower, there is little sex to spice up the film, regardless of the sexy premise. If Heading South had done more with the political and social unrest on the island, as a metaphor for the women's unrest at the resort, there would have been a much more substantial film. We are left with a not very interesting plot bolstered by very interesting and beautiful older actresses, Rampling and Young.

When I first heard about this film I was determined to go see it as it sounded like the makings of a great film. It did have the makings of a great film, but unfortunately they didn't make a great film out of it! It was boring, tension-free and uneventful. It was impossible to empathise with any of the main characters as none of them had strong enough characters to provoke any interest from the viewer. The fact that it was set in Haiti during Baby Doc's reign of terror should have meant that there was a palpable sense of fear or dread throughout the entire film...there was none, apart from very brief moments. Even the central theme of older ladies travelling to a poor country to use local young men as sex toys for the duration of their holiday wasn't explored in any depth. Overall, a disappointing experience.