''When Men Carried Clubs and Women Played Ding-Dong'' ( it, Quando gli uomini armarono la clava e... con le donne fecero din don) is a 1971 film directed by

Bruno Corbucci Bruno Corbucci (23 October 1931 – 7 September 1996) was an Italian screenwriter and film director. He was the younger brother of Sergio Corbucci, and wrote many of his films. He was born in Rome, where he also died. The vast majority o ...

Plot

While two prehistoric tribes are fighting against each other, Listra, a woman, is trying to persuade her 'husband' not to join the war. In order to achieve the same goal with their respective partners, the women of the tribe start a

sex strike A sex strike (sex boycott), or more formally known as Lysistratic nonaction, is a method of nonviolent resistance in which one or more persons refrain from or refuse sex with partners until policy or social demands are met. It is a form of tem ...

Production

The story is a free adaptation in

Prehistoric times Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use of ...

of two comedies by

Aristophanes Aristophanes (; grc, Ἀριστοφάνης, ; c. 446 – c. 386 BC), son of Philippus, of the deme In Ancient Greece, a deme or ( grc, δῆμος, plural: demoi, δημοι) was a suburb or a subdivision of Athens and other city-states ...

, ''

Lysistrata ''Lysistrata'' ( or ; Attic Greek: , ''Lysistrátē'', "Army Disbander") is an ancient Greek comedy by Aristophanes, originally performed in classical Athens in 411 BC. It is a comic account of a woman's extraordinary mission to end the Peloponne ...

'' and '' Women at the Thesmophoria'' The film was shot between Tor San Lorenzo and Tor Caldera, in the Lazio region, a location usually chosen by Corbucci and other directors for

Spaghetti westerns The Spaghetti Western is a broad subgenre of Western films produced in Europe. It emerged in the mid-1960s in the wake of Sergio Leone's film-making style and international box-office success. The term was used by foreign critics because most o ...

Critical response

A contemporary review in the "Segnalazioni Cinematografiche” saw in it A retrospective review of the English dubbed DVD version distributed by Cheezy Flicks states: "It's not particularly well dubbed, not particularly sexy, and not even nearly as funny as it seems to want to be. However, if you're into low-budget B-movies or you have some weird caveman fetish, then this could very well be the film for you" while a review of the 2003 DVD released by Something Weird Video finds that "As moviemaking, this is very basic stuff. Most of the film is shot on exterior sets of fairly well-dressed tribal camps. The lighting is basic and the 'scope screen allows directors Corbucci and Campanile to play the action loose. There aren't any special effects, and the actual content of the film is basically 30 hairy guys and sexy gals running around on some barren real estate. ''Ding Dong'' wants to be funny rather than outright sexy. There's enough nudity to go around, but most of the soft sex scenes cut away from the action, just as older films did. There's a gay 'interior decorator' typed caveman on hand for some cheap digs. If one is deeply into stupid comedy, there might be a laugh here. (...) The picture is just a big curiosity."

References

External links

*{{IMDb title, 0067638 1971 films 1971 comedy films Italian comedy films 1970s Italian-language films 1970s Italian films Films set in prehistory Films based on Lysistrata Films based on works by Aristophanes Films directed by Bruno Corbucci