A TAIL TOLD BY IDIOTS

Raquel Welch's global hit One Million Years B.C. spawns another bad imitation.

There’s little to say about When Women Had Tails. It’s terrible Italian slapstick, complete with pratfalls and camel flatulence, punctuating a story dealing with a group of isolated cavemen who discover their first woman—Senta Berger. They want to roast and eat her, but she convinces one of them there are other satisfactions she can provide. We imagine this involves a little eating too, and the movie would be better if it showed something along those lines, but no such luck.

Blame Raquel Welch for this fiasco, because once again this is an attempt to replicate the formula of her smash hit One Million Years B.C.—a bad attempt, far worse than When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth, which we talked about recently. It takes a full twenty-one minutes of idiotic slapstickery before the cavemen finally come across Berger, and only after that point is the movie even watchable. It premiered in Italy as Quando le donne avevano la coda in October 1970, and had its U.S. unveiling today in 1973. Bad as it is, we can’t resist these prehistoric fantasies, and we’ll forge ahead bravely to the next. 

It probably should have been the Tail end of her career.

Another Italian movie that premiered today is Pasquale Festa Campanile’s prehistoric comedy Quando le donne avevano la coda, aka When Women Had Tails. The above promo shot shows Austrian star Senta Berger in full costume for her role as Filli, the cavewoman captured by a clan of seven men who have never seen a woman. They quickly learn that she doesn’t, in fact, have a tail, and shortly thereafter uncover other anatomical curiosities. The movie’s so bad it’s miraculous Berger ever worked again, but you have to love this ’70s glam rock look. And if not, she appears as a normal human below. 

Femme Fatale Image

ABOUT

SEARCH PULP INTERNATIONAL

PULP INTL.
HISTORY REWIND

The headlines that mattered yesteryear.

1954—First Church of Scientology Established

The first Scientology church, based on the writings of science fiction author L. Ron Hubbard, is established in Los Angeles, California. Since then, the city has become home to the largest concentration of Scientologists in the world, and its ranks include high-profile adherents such as Tom Cruise and John Travolta.

1933—Blaine Act Passes

The Blaine Act, a congressional bill sponsored by Wisconsin senator John J. Blaine, is passed by the U.S. Senate and officially repeals the 18th Amendment to the United States Constitution, aka the Volstead Act, aka Prohibition. The repeal is formally adopted as the 21st Amendment to the Constitution on December 5, 1933.

1947—Voice of America Begins Broadcasting into U.S.S.R.

The state radio channel known as Voice of America and controlled by the U.S. State Department, begins broadcasting into the Soviet Union in Russian with the intent of countering Soviet radio programming directed against American leaders and policies. The Soviet Union responds by initiating electronic jamming of VOA broadcasts.

1937—Carothers Patents Nylon

Wallace H. Carothers, an American chemist, inventor and the leader of organic chemistry at DuPont Corporation, receives a patent for a silk substitute fabric called nylon. Carothers was a depressive who for years carried a cyanide capsule on a watch chain in case he wanted to commit suicide, but his genius helped produce other polymers such as neoprene and polyester. He eventually did take cyanide—not in pill form, but dissolved in lemon juice—resulting in his death in late 1937.

1933—Franklin Roosevelt Survives Assassination Attempt

In Miami, Florida, Giuseppe Zangara attempts to shoot President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, but is restrained by a crowd and, in the course of firing five wild shots, hits five people, including Chicago, Illinois Mayor Anton J. Cermak, who dies of his wounds three weeks later. Zangara is quickly tried and sentenced to eighty years in jail for attempted murder, but is later convicted of murder when Cermak dies. Zangara is sentenced to death and executed in Florida’s electric chair.

Unknown artist produces lurid cover for Indian true crime magazine Nutan Kahaniyan.
Cover art by Roswell Keller for the 1948 Pocket Books edition of Ramona Stewart's Desert Town.

VINTAGE ADVERTISING

Things you'd love to buy but can't anymore

Vintage Ad Image

Around the web