Claudia Cardinale brushes off furore over retouched Cannes festival photo

Claudia Cardinale has dismissed what she called “a fake row” over the alleged airbrushing of her photograph on the official poster for this year’s Cannes Film Festival to make her appear thinner.

Feminists and French commentators poured scorn on festival organisers for apparently tampering with the image of the 78-year-old Italian star swirling her skirt on a Rome rooftop in 1959.

Claire Serre-Combe of the French women’s group Osez Le Feminisme (Dare to be Feminist) said it was scandalous that Cardinale, famous for her hourglass figure, should be forced to “lose kilos” for the poster.

The newspaper Le Monde provided a slide tool on its website for readers to see how the image had been changed to make her waistline narrower. “While the poster is magnificent, the photograph has clearly and deplorably been airbrushed to make the actress’s thighs appear thinner,” it commented. “What a pity.

The issue is highly sensitive in France, which banned excessively thin models from working in the fashion industry two years ago amid increasing concern about anorexia.

Social media users said the altered Cardinale image was imposed by “the dictatorship of thinness,” but the actress herself, known as an outspoken advocate of women’s rights, defended the changes.

“This image has been retouched to accentuate this effect of lightness and transpose me into a dream character,” she said.

“This concern for realism has no place here and, as a committed feminist, I see no affront to the female body. There are many more important things to discuss in our world. It’s only cinema.”

In a statement released by the festival, Cardinale said she was honoured to feature on the poster for its 70th anniversary year.

The image of her rooftop dance in Rome, at the age of 21, “reminds me of a time when I could never have imagined climbing up the red-carpeted steps [in Cannes],” she added.

The festival’s director, Thierry Fremaux, said the poster was “very well received”.

Named by the Los Angeles Times Magazine in 2011 as one of the 50 most beautiful women in film history, Cardinale starred in some of the most acclaimed films of the 1960s and 1970s.

Born and brought up in Tunisia, she became famous for her role in The Pink Panther, appearing with David Niven. She also featured in Hollywood blockbusters including Blindfold, with Rock Hudson, in 1965, The Professionals and Sergio Leone’s epic western, Once Upon a Time in the West.

She also starred in Federico Fellini’s 8½ and Luchino Visconti’s The Leopard.

Cardinale has been a UNESCO goodwill ambassador for the defence of women’s rights since 2000.