Its main theme, "More", won a Grammy Award and earned an Oscar nomination for Best Original Song, and was covered by such artists as Frank Sinatra, Andy Williams, Roy Orbison, and Vince Guaraldi.

At the beach in polyandrous Kiriwina, one of the Trobriand Islands in New Guinea, a large crowd of topless native women run after a handful of men, trying to capture them "not only for autographs".

On the French Riviera, a small group of blonde bikini-clad young women on a boat drive by a ship with U.S. sailors, "wooing" them teasingly from the distance by sending them kisses, showing their tongues and flaunting their breasts.

Also in New Guinea, at a celebration that recurs every five years, in a matter of hours, dozens of pigs are slaughtered by beating on their heads with wooden poles, and eaten, after which the partly cannibalistic community returns to its perpetual state of hunger.

On New Guinean Tabar, the most beautiful women are locked up in small wooden cages and fed tapioca until they reach 120 kilos (264 pounds) to be offered as wives to the village dictator.

In Nocera Terinese, on Good Friday, each “vattienti" beats their legs with glass shards and spill their blood on the streets where the procession will take place.

A parade of the "Life Savers Girls Association", all from 16 to 20 years old, march toward Sydney's Manly Beach, where they put on a surf carnival, including CPR on young men.

The French artist Yves Klein, erroneously introduced as Czechoslovakian, comes forward from one of his monochromatic blue paintings to start of a line of musicians to play his Monotone Symphony.

Adjacent are some scantlilly if at all clad young ladies immersing themselves in blue colour, which they later, under the instruction of the artist will, impress from their bodies to a canvass and create a work of art for sale for 4 million French Francs, then worth about 800,000 US-Dollars.

The film concludes with footage of a group of indigenous people who live as part of a cargo cult in the mountains near the airport of Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea.

Having encountered and interacted with foreign airmen during World War II, the people have erected icons of worship that resemble an airport runway, airplane, and control tower using bamboo.

It won the David di Donatello for Best Production (Migliore Produzione) by the Accademia del Cinema Italiano,[6] which it shared with Una vita difficile.

The film also inspired lampooning, including Mr. Mike's Mondo Video, written by Saturday Night Live's Michael O'Donoghue and starring members of the contemporary cast of the program.