The Wild Women of Wongo (1958)

The film starts with narration from Mother Nature, discussing an experiment with Father Time that went wrong. On the (fictional) island of Wongo she created a tribe where the men are brutish and ugly and the women are beautiful. She then creates a tribe on a nearby island called Goona where the women are repulsive and the men are strong and handsome. For years the two tribes lived unaware of each other's existence, until ape men from across the ocean attack the village of Goona.

The tribe sends their king's son to seek help against the invaders. The son finds the island of Wongo, the day before the village men pick their brides. The women, seeing the handsome prince, begin questioning their life among the brutes that dwell in the village. The men grow jealous of their visitor and plot to kill him. The women of Wongo, finding out about this, risk their lives to protect the prince, and in doing so offend the crocodile god of the Wongo people (portrayed by stock footage of a crocodilian and a rubber model).

The women are rounded up by the village men and are sent out into the wilderness until the reptile god has drawn blood for the insult. The women band together, watching each other's backs until the ape men arrive at their village and, after they dispatch the invaders to the god, leave in search for the men that had abandoned the island of Wongo. In Goona, the men have just begun their rite of manhood, in which they go into the jungle, without weapons, for a month. The women of Wongo, coming upon the weaponless men, decide to take advantage of their helplessness and, one by one, claim them in marriage. The film concludes with all the beautiful men and women married, and the ugly men with the ugly women.

#vintage #wongo #feminism