''The Ape Woman'' (, ) is a 1964 Italian-French

satirical Satire is a genre of the visual arts, visual, literature, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently Nonfiction, non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ...

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. The drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular ...

directed by

Marco Ferreri Marco Ferreri (11 May 1928 – 9 May 1997) was an Italian film director, screenwriter and actor, who began his career in the 1950s directing three films in Spain, followed by 24 Italian films before his death in 1997. He is considered one of t ...

. The film was inspired by the real-life story of

Julia Pastrana Julia Pastrana (August 1834 – 25 March 1860) was a performer and singer during the 19th century who had hypertrichosis. Pastrana, an Indigenous Mexican, indigenous woman from Mexico, was born in 1834, somewhere in the state of Sinaloa.Lerma Gara ...

, a 19th-century woman who was exploited as a freak show attraction. In 2008, the film was included in the Italian Ministry of Cultural Heritage's 100 Italian films to be saved, a list of 100 films that "have changed the collective memory of the country between 1942 and 1978."

Plot

In a convent in

Naples Naples ( ; ; ) is the Regions of Italy, regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 908,082 within the city's administrative limits as of 2025, while its Metropolitan City of N ...

, entrepreneur Antonio Focaccia discovers Maria, who is completely covered with hair. He opens a business where he presents her as "the ape woman" whom he allegedly found in Africa. When he tries to sell her virginity to a professor, Maria resists and returns to the convent. To have her back, Antonio is forced to marry Maria at the convent's insistence. After a successful audition in front of

impresario An impresario (from Italian ''impresa'', 'an enterprise or undertaking') is a person who organizes and often finances concerts, Play (theatre), plays, or operas, performing a role in stage arts that is similar to that of a film producer, film or ...

Majeroni, the two are celebrated in night clubs in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

, where Maria performs semi-nude. When Maria turns out to be pregnant, the examining doctor suggests an abortion as the baby might turn out a "monster". Maria rejects the possibility of an abortion and returns to Naples with Antonio to have her child. Both she and the child die shortly after the delivery, and their bodies are embalmed and presented at the museum of natural history. Antonio buys the bodies back from the museum and exhibits them in his own show.

Cast

Ugo Tognazzi Ottavio "Ugo" Tognazzi (23 March 1922 – 27 October 1990) was an Italian actor, director, and screenwriter. He is considered one of the most important faces of Italian comedy together with Vittorio Gassman, Nino Manfredi, Marcello Mastr ...

as Antonio Focaccia *

Annie Girardot Annie Suzanne Girardot (25 October 193128 February 2011) was a French actress. She often played strong-willed, independent, hard-working, and often lonely women, imbuing her characters with an earthiness and reality that endeared her to women un ...

as Maria *

Achille Majeroni Achille Majeroni (24 August 1881 – 12 October 1964) was an Italian film actor. Born in Syracuse, Sicily, son of Achille Majeroni and his second wife Graziosa Bignetti, he made his stage debut at age twelve with the Marazzi-Diligenti c ...

as Majeroni (credited as Achille Maieroni) * Filippo Pompa Marcelli as Bruno * as Sister Furgonicino (credited as Linda De Felice) * Elvira Paolini as chambermaid * Ugo Rossi as retiree * Antonio Altoviti as professor

Release

''The Ape Woman'' was first screened in

Bologna Bologna ( , , ; ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Emilia-Romagna region in northern Italy. It is the List of cities in Italy, seventh most populous city in Italy, with about 400,000 inhabitants and 150 different nationalities. Its M ...

, Italy, on 29 January 1964 and, after being shown in competition at the

1964 Cannes Film Festival The 17th Cannes Film Festival took place from 29 April to 14 May 1964. Austrian filmmaker Fritz Lang served as jury president for the main competition. On this edition, the ''Palme d’Or'' was renamed "''Grand Prix du Festival International du ...

, released in French cinemas on 24 June 1964. After its 4K restoration in 2017, the film was released on

Blu-ray Blu-ray (Blu-ray Disc or BD) is a digital optical disc data storage format designed to supersede the DVD format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released worldwide on June 20, 2006, capable of storing several hours of high-defin ...

and digital platforms on 11 October 2021.

Alternate endings

''The Ape Woman'' exists in three different versions. In the version intended by Ferreri, Maria dies during childbirth, and the embalmed corpses of mother and child are presented by Antonio in public. This version was cut (either by the Italian censors or preventively by producer Ponti) before the Italian theatrical release, omitting the exhibition of the bodies. The longer French version adds an alternate ending, where Maria gives birth to a healthy child and loses her body hair, forcing Antonio to work at the docks to support his family. According to the restored version's title card, the lighter French version played at the Cannes Film Festival, while the

Cinémathèque Française A cinematheque is an archive of films and film-related objects with an exhibition venue. Similarly to a book library (bibliothèque in French), a cinematheque is responsible for preserving and making available to the public film heritage. Typically ...

states that Ferreri's darker original version was screened in Cannes, meeting with negative reactions.

Jean de Baroncelli Jean de Baroncelli (25 March 1914 - 31 July 1998) was a French writer. Having achieved some success as a novelist, in 1953 he became a film critic, contributing regularly for Le Monde till 1983. Life Marie Joseph Henri Jean de Baroncelli was bor ...

's review written for ''

Le Monde (; ) is a mass media in France, French daily afternoon list of newspapers in France, newspaper. It is the main publication of Le Monde Group and reported an average print circulation, circulation of 480,000 copies per issue in 2022, including ...

'' during the Cannes Film Festival explicitly describes Maria's and the child's deaths and their posthumous presentation by Antonio, which corresponds with Ferreri's version. Diverging statements also exist whether it was Italian producer

Carlo Ponti Carlo Fortunato Pietro Ponti Sr. (11 December 1912 – 10 January 2007) was an Italian film producer with more than 140 productions to his credit. Along with Dino De Laurentiis, he is credited with reinvigorating and popularizing Italian cin ...

who demanded an upbeat ending for the French release, or (as recalled by Annie Girardot) French co-producer Les Films Marceau Cocinor.

Reception

In their 1964 articles for ''

L'Espresso () is an Italian progressive weekly news magazine. It is one of the two most prominent Italian weeklies; the other is the conservative magazine . Since 2022, it has been published by BFC Media. From 7 August 2016 to 10 September 2023, it was ...

'' and ''

Paese Sera ''Paese Sera'' was an Italian afternoon newspaper published between 1949 and 1994. History The newspaper was founded in Rome in 1949, as the afternoon edition of the newspaper ''Il Paese''. Close to the Italian Communist Party, it was intended ...

'',

Alberto Moravia Alberto Pincherle (; 28 November 1907 – 26 September 1990), known by his pseudonym Alberto Moravia ( , ), was an Italian novelist and journalist. His novels explored matters of modern sexuality, social alienation and existentialism. Moravia i ...

and Aldo Scagnetti criticised the decision to end the film with Maria's and her child's deaths and omit the presentation of their bodies for the Italian theatrical release. While Moravia argued that the story had lost its "logical conclusion", Scagnetti lamented that Ferreri's original ending had given "meaning to his apologue, or at least ��greater substance to its cruel bitterness". According to Annie Girardot's biographer Pascal Mérigeau, ''The Ape Woman'' met almost unanimously with "contempt and disgust" by the French press. Jean de Baroncelli of ''Le Monde'', reporting from the Cannes Film Festival, found the film "difficult to bear", lacking "prodigious comic force, an exceptional sense of the grotesque" and "extreme sensitivity" which the "unsavory subject" would have required. Upon the film's

New York New York most commonly refers to: * New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States * New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York New York may also refer to: Places United Kingdom * ...

opening in September 1964 (where it was shown in the French version),

Bosley Crowther Francis Bosley Crowther Jr. (July 13, 1905 – March 7, 1981) was an American journalist, writer, and film critic for ''The New York Times'' for 27 years. His work helped shape the careers of many actors, directors and screenwriters, though some ...

of the ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

'' found an "oddly distasteful film", with many scenes being "more painful than amusing, more horrid than humorous". Reviewing the film for ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' upon its 2021 re-release, critic

Peter Bradshaw Peter Nicholas Bradshaw (born 19 June 1962) is a British writer and film critic. He has been chief film critic at ''The Guardian'' since 1999, and is a contributing editor at ''Esquire'' magazine. Early life and education Bradshaw was educat ...

saw a "broadly heartwarming, if strange cautionary tale of hubris, redemption and love", which gained "a new tenderness and complexity" by watching both Ferreri's and the French version side by side, comparing it, among others, with '' Freaks'' and ''

La Strada ''La Strada'', also translated into English as ''The Road'', is a 1954 Italian Drama (film and television), drama film directed by Federico Fellini and co-written by Fellini, Tullio Pinelli and Ennio Flaiano. The film tells the story of Gelsomin ...

''.

Awards

* 1965

Nastro d'Argento The (plural: ''Nastri d'Argento''; English: Silver Ribbon) is an Italian film award, held since 1946 by the ''Sindacato Nazionale Giornalisti Cinematografici Italiani'' (Italian National Union of Film Journalists). Awards are given annually in ...

for best original subject

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ape Woman, The 1964 drama films 1960s Italian-language films 1960s French-language films French black-and-white films Italian black-and-white films Films directed by Marco Ferreri Films with screenplays by Rafael Azcona 1964 multilingual films French multilingual films Italian multilingual films 1960s French films 1960s Italian films French-language Italian films Films scored by Teo Usuelli French-language drama films Italian-language drama films Italian-language French films