The Ape Woman trailer
THE APE WOMAN is the highest-praised film by Marco Ferreri, the over-the-top iconoclastic director known for 'La Grande Bouffe'. His signature edgy exploration of the grotesque was revered by the Cannes Festival who awarded many of his works.
The film is inspired by a true story of the nihilistically cruel exploitation of a young carnival performer, Julia Pastrana, whose body was completely covered in hair.
She is brought to life here by an extraordinary Annie Girardot -France's highest-paid actress of the time - in a natural measured and elegant performance from which emanates the ambiguous emotion of being alluring yet devastatingly poignant as 'the ape woman'.
An unscrupulous hustler (a magnificent Ugo Tognazzi), discovers the young woman in a convent and marries her in order to get her on the freak-show circuit and cash in on the distinctive appearance of her body and face covered in hair.