Donkey Skin

Based on a fairytale by Charles Perrault (Cinderella), Jacques Demy’s Donkey Skin – (Peau D'Ane) – is a wonderfully bizarre story concerning the king (Jean Marais, Orphée) of a strange and enchanted land. Catherine Deneuve plays the dual role of the king's wife and daughter. When the wife dies, she makes the king promise that he'll never marry anyone less beautiful than she; thus, he is compelled to wed his own daughter. A fairy godmother (Delphine Seyrig, Last Year at Marienbad) tries to save the girl from this incestuous fate by advising that she make impossible demands for her wedding gifts. One such demand is for the skin of a magic donkey. Featuring classic songs by Michel Legrand, Donkey Skin is a warts and all fairytale, ripe with incorrect royalism and medieval misogyny.