Icons of Cinema You’ve Probably Never Heard of: Edwige Fenech

Icons of Cinema You’ve Probably Never Heard of: Edwige Fenech

Why She is Important –

The undisputed queen of Italian sex comedies and giallo film. An Italian film icon.

The Details –

If you were to take inventory, Tunisian born actress Edwige Fenech probably took more showers in films than she did in real life. While we are not passing judgment on Fenech’s hygiene, it is pretty safe to assume the previous  statement is true. The Queen of Italian sex comedies in the 1970s, Fenech would take on more serious roles as her career progressed. The film noir-esque Giallo genre would suit the tall, dark and beautiful actress as much as the comedies did.

Giallo films were dark and bloody and served as a precursor to the slasher films of the 1980. While the genres may have differed, it was pretty much a guarantee that Ms. Fenech would have a nude scene at some point.

Eventually, their popularity would give way to the more straight horror and our heroine would return to the familiar fied of comedy and showers. The website Cult Sirens describes Fenech this way –

“To talk about Edwige Fenech to fans of seventies European exploitation movies is to talk about Mecca to a Muslim. Needless to say, in swimming amongst potential Cult Sirens, we can find some that are less known than others. One of them is Edwige Fenech, a curious name than means nothing to common mortals.”

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=7iEc73rDc9M

What Wikipedia Has to Say –

“Fenech starred in many genres of cinema but her greatest commercial success came with commedia sexy all’italiana films, particularly including earlier works Ubalda, All Naked and Warm and Giovannona Long–Thigh, as well as the followingl’insegnante (school teacher), la soldatessa (soldier), la poliziotta (policewoman) series and other films that featured Fenech in stereotypical professions, which further bolstered Fenech’s position as the most popular actress of the genre”