5 bambole per la luna d'agosto
Tags: cult, horror, murder

Plot synopsis:
At a desert island retreat owned by wealthy industrialist George Stark (Teodor Corra), a group of people have assembled for a weekend getaway of relaxation. Foremost among the guests is Professor Gerry Farrell (William Berger), an inventor/scientist who is badly in need of a vacation. While the first night passes uneventfully, with the group sitting around the fireplace at Stark's large seaside house singing folk songs, Farrell is enraged to discover on the next morning that Stark, together with several of the guests, has planned this entire getaway as an opportunity to coerce him in to selling his latest invention: a formula for industrial resin.Farrell is immediately established as a decent man, and although his marriage to his wife, Trudy (Ira Furstenberg), appears to be content, she is actually involved in a secret lesbian affair with Stark's artist wife Jill (Edith Meloni). Actually, none of the relationships are particularly healthy. Stark's business partner, Nick (Maurice Poli), is verbally abusive to his coquettish wife Marie (Edwige Fenech), but does not object to her sleeping with other men, one of whom is the houseboy and manservant Charles (Mauro Bosco). Stark is less of a husband to Jill than he is a business manager. Stark arranges for Jill to have her paintings and artwork publicly displayed and is also a source of constant criticism. The sole happy couple appears to be Nick's co-worker Jack (Renato Rossini), and his wife Peggy (Helene Ronee). Also among the guests is Isabelle (Justine Gall), a young teenage girl who seems to be in Stark's care while her parents are away.As Stark, Nick, and Jack badger Farrell for the secret of the formula by offering him $1 million each from their Swiss bank accounts, Jill makes a horrible discovery on the beach: the dead body of Charles. Having already sent the motor launch away to prevent Farrell from leaving, and with the radio strangely out of commission, Stark has no way of contacting the mainland. So, Charles body is moved into a large walk-in freezer where it hangs with other 'chunks of meat'.A little later, Farrell himself is the next victim. While he is walking alone on the beach, a sniper shoots him down. Trudy and Jill, walking hand-in-hand nearby, hear the gunshot and find Farrell's dead body and run way to tell the others. But the sniper is revealed to be Isabelle, who places Farrell's body in a rowboat and pushes him out to sea.As tempers flare to Farrell's killing and 'disappearance', the killings then escalate with alarming regularity. Peggy, standing on the balcony of her room, gets shot to death by an unseen assailant. Jack arrives on the scene first, and accuses Stark of being responsible, which he denies. Soon after, Marie turns up dead, having been tied to a tree with a knife sticking out of her chest. Then, Jill turns up dead in her bathtub after being electrocuted. Each of the bodies are placed in the freezer. Rather than risk anymore bloodshed, the four remaining survivors of Stark, Jack, Nick, and Trudy hold up in Stark's living room for the night. In this way they believe, the killer cannot strike without revealing him or herself. After bickering with Trudy, Nick storms off into the night. The next morning, he too is found dead, and his body is placed in 'cold storage'.Up to this point, Stark is the most possible suspect when he sneaks out of the house and uncovers a motorboat which will take him to the mainland. As he returns to the house to get supplies, Jack confronts him where he reveals himself to be the killer, having killed off everyone to steal the $1 million cashiers checks from their bank accounts. Before Stark can to anything, Jack shoots him dead. But its revealed that Jack has not been acting alone. After killing Stark, Jack meets in the freezer with Trudy who is the real mastermind behind the whole scheme. Trudy had met with Jack before arriving on the island and offered to kill everybody so she can steal the million dollar cashier checks from Stark, Nick, in order to hand him over the formula for the resin. Jack even was forced to kill Peggy too because she got too close to discovering his plan. Jack then offers to hand Trudy over the three $1 million cashier checks, as she produces the microfilm for the resin formula. But Trudy tries to pull the same trick on Jack, by shooting him in the head, and stealing the three million dollar checks for herself. But having anticipated Trudy's betrayal, Jack manages to shoot her with his gun before expiring. At this point, Isabelle, who had been hiding in the secret passageways in the house through most of the movie, enters the freezer where Trudy and Jack killed each other, and calmly collects the three checks from Trudy's handbag.Epilogue. In an incredulous, off-the-wall twist set months later, as well-dressed Isabelle arrives at the state prison where Farrell is incarcerated. It turns out that Farrell, the apparent 'hero' of the story, actually stole the invention of the resin himself, murdering the true inventor in the process. Together with his wife, Trudy, it was Farrell who concocted the whole scheme of murder and duplicity for the sole purpose to steal Stark's, Nick's, and Jack's money. But Farrell's treachery has not gone unpunished. In their conversion on the island earlier, Farrell had met with Isabelle and had her shoot him with a drugged bullet to make it appear that he would be dead to get away from the others, whom he duped Isabelle into thinking were trying to kill him. But after shooting and drugging the professor, Isabelle pushed him out to sea in an open boat hoping someone would rescue him. Unfortunately for Farrell, his rescuers ended up being the police on their way to Stark's island and, unknown to him, the drug Isabelle used on him made him so delirious which made him confess his crimes of murdering the inventor for the resin and orchestrating with Trudy, who subcontracted Jack, to murder everyone on the island for the money. Isabelle runs off with the $3 million, leaving Farrell behind on death row to be hung for his crimes.

Review: Art direction and cinematography are as distinctive as any of Bava's other giallo films of the period, but the garbled script to what is essentially little more than a standard body-count movie really lets this one down.
The late Italian director Mario Bava (1913-1980) made a handful of genuinely great films, like Black Sunday, Lisa and the Devil, and Blood and Black Lace, along with many that almost transcend kitsch, i.e. Diabolik and Black Sabbath, and some that are simply wonderful kitsch.
When he refuses to sell the formula, everybody on the island starts dying one by one (a la Agatha Christie's Ten Little Indians,) the bodies literally piling up in the meat locker, just one example of the hilariously dark humor Bava brings to this dubious premise.Bava made no bones about this movie being a paycheck job, or of his shame for it - the script was atrocious, the producer refused to let him have any say in the casting, or let Bava use most of his usual crew, and budget cuts forced the director to have almost every murder take place offscreen.
But Bava's films always had a misanthropic wit(except Black Sunday, with its clear-cut good versus evil scenario,) and in the case of "Five Dolls For An August Moon," it almost seems like the director's contempt for the project actually made the end result funnier and more brazen than expected.
Of course he doesn't want to sell at any price and this leads to resentment and veiled threats which leads to all on the island being killed off one by one, in this "Ten little Indians" type thriller and of course there is a storm brewing and the phones are down, I think you get the picture.Now how do I review a Bava film without mentioning "Stylish" or "Superb use of Colour".
I don't think I can really,but I will try..This films theme is reminiscent of Bava's more famous work Bay of Blood, with its high body count.it has a funky little score too, very 60's..the film at times tends towards black comedy with the body bags swinging in the freezer, I have to say it made me laugh and as with all Bava films the women are quite nice to look atin particular Edwige Fenech a lady I have heard a lot about and I can see why.all in all an enjoyable little thriller, not Bava's best work but certainly worth a look.
Still, it does have some nice macabre touches that would have graced his best films, such as the repeat scene of the murder victims hanging up in the freezer wrapped in plastic; or the shot of crystal balls rolling en mass down a set of stairs and into a bathroom leading us to yet another dead body.
George Stark (Teodoro Corrà), a wealthy industrialist, invites several business friends and their partners to his island retreat for the weekend, with the intention of convincing scientist Gerry Farrell (William Berger) to sell his secret formula for a new industrial resin.
Philanthropist Gerry isn't interested in making a deal, intending instead to make his invention public, a fact that forces one or more of the guests to turn to murder.The general consensus seems to be that this is one of director Mario Bava's weakest efforts (even Bava himself was reportedly not fond of the film, being contractually obliged to direct); I can't really comment much on that since I've seen too few of his films to compare, but what I can say is that, even though I found the twists and turns of this Italian variation of Agatha Christie's Ten little Indians virtually impossible to fathom (especially the twist ending), there were still enough positives to make it worth a go.As with many a giallo, the female cast are very easy on the eye, with genre regular Edwige Fenech stripping off whenever possible as always.
But against Farrell's wishes, the group goes behind each other's back to obtain information on Farrell's chemistry ideas and soon the guests and residents start turning up dead one by one as Stark and Farrell must rally the group together to determine the identity of the killer (or killers) despite nobody trusting anyone.Most people I know would list Five Dolls for an August Moon as among their least favorite film that Mario Bava made.
One of the few films directed by Italian horror maestro Mario Bava that I hadn't seen, as well as a film starring my latest object of cinematic lust, Edwige Fenech, 1970's "Five Dolls for an August Moon" was one that I eagerly popped into my DVD player at home.
The wealthy investor George Stark (Teodoro Corrá), his partner Jack Davidson (Howard Ross) and their business friend Nick Chaney (Maurice Poli) invite Professor Fritz Farrell (William Berger) and his wife Trudy Farrell (Ira Furstenberg) to spend a weekend with their wives Jill Stark (Edith Meloni), Peggy Davison (Helena Ronee) and Marie Chaney (Edwige Fenech) in a remote island that belongs to George.
Then, each guest is murdered and the survivors bring the bodies to the freeze and try to discover who might be the killer."5 Doll for an August Moon" is a weird, flawed and silly black humor comedy of Mario Bava.
It is painfully obvious that Bava feels nothing for this film and despite a strong cast, a great soundtrack, and some fine scenes, FIVE DOLLS falls flat.A group of rich swingers take a vacation on a secluded island in a nouveau riche, futuristic mansion.
A few good sequences include the multiple bodies hanging in the meat freezer, Edwige doing a sultry dance in the opening number that results in a "sacrifice", Edwige lounging on a rotating bed, and a fight scene that results in many marbles tumbling and rolling down a spiral staircase (REALLY gorgeous scene!).FIVE DOLLS is a film I would only recommend to hardcore Bava or Fenech fans.
Mario Bava himself repeatedly stated that this is the worst film he was ever involved in, so luckily enough there still are some loyal and naive fan-boys (like myself) to reassure the public that "5 Dolls for an August Moon" nonetheless remains a worthy purchase and definitely better than your average horror/mystery from the early 70's.
The dialogs are weak yet almost the entire film is foreseen of a jazzy soundtrack, which actually makes "5 Dolls for an August Moon" Bava's most swinging horror movie (the über-cool "Danger: Diabolik" is falls into a class of its own).
Mario Bava is a great horror film director, but this is not one of his best works.The plot of this movie is along similar lines to that of one of his masterpiece's, "Bay of Blood", in that it revolves around money and a murderer.
What follows is a crescendo of murders as one by one the friends start turning up dead and the remaining survivors then don't know who amongst is the killer and therefore who to trust.Unlike a lot of Bava's other work; this film features little in the way of suspense or atmosphere, and the music isn't always as good as Bava's fans have come to expect.
By the time the film reaches it's climax, it doesn't really matter who the murderer is, as the intent is obvious from the start and the characters are largely samey and therefore uninteresting, and that's not a good way for a movie to keep the viewer's interest.This film isn't especially bad, but it's very average and doesn't meet the high standards that Bava has set for himself with his earlier (and later) works.
Just like my feet, so do the morals of 100% of the characters in this film - A bunch of beatnik types on a remote island courtesy of George Stark, an uber wealthy guy who's brought these people here in order to obtain a new chemical formula discovered by William Berger.Being the sixties, everyone's a bit groovy and all into each other's pants - Maurice Poli's wife Edwidge has huge Robert Smith circa 1984 hair and gold lame trousers and loves dancing in her bra and sleeping with the guy who owns the yacht.
Bava's one of those special cooks who just has a natural touch that makes everything taste everything better than anyone else.When not cooking, Bava made some of the best Gialli too, thanks to his ability to film things from unusual angles, fitting all the characters in one scene in one shot, and throwing in a curveball or too to totally confuse the viewer (that comes an hour into this one, where I thought the story had just forward to the end for some reason).
As innovative as Bava was (and still is), his filmography contains a few duds, and Five Dolls for an August Moon is one example.Taking inspiration from, of all people, Agatha Christie and her novel Ten Little N*****s (now commonly referred to as Ten Little Indians, understandably), Five Dolls groups a bunch of wealthy people together at a weekend getaway owned by George Stark (Teodoro Corra).
Despite being a fan of Mario Bava and have loved some of his other movies such as 'Black Sabbath', 'Blood and Black Lace' & "A Bay Of Blood', I can't say that I liked this one however as I found this quite tame and very disappointing and just tends to limp from scene to scene without much thought or logic, even Bava himself said that this was his least favourite movie and considering he had no creative control over this project, it was a surprise that this wasn't a total disaster.The plot centres around wealthy businessman George Stark who gathers a group of friends to his island retreat and hopes to gain a secret formula from one of the guests who happens to be a scientist for his own gain, but soon things take a turn for the worse when people begin to turn up dead in true whodunit style.Obviously this takes inspiration from the Agatha Christies 'And Then There Were None', only adding more sex and craziness to the proceedings, as well as blending the novels mystery and suspense elements to the mix.
Plus it was nice to see Italian goddess Edwige Fenech in her debut, but she isn't given anything to do and even she couldn't save this mess.So in all I wouldn't really recommend this unless you're fan of Italian thrillers or Mario Bava, but otherwise it's fairly routine murder mystery fodder and the perfect example of style or substance..
One of them, a chemist who has just created a revolutionary resin, is propositioned by his counterparts for the formula, and within a mere twenty- four hours, the body count has begun.What is essentially an Italian retake on Agatha Christie's "Ten Little Indians," "5 Dolls for an August Moon" is purported to be one of director Mario Bava's self-admitted failures, and while this isn't a perfect film, I'm not sure I'd go so far as saying it is his worst.
The script for the film is unabashedly cribbed from the Christie novel, utilizing a setup that many horror films have come to tout, but in spite of the unoriginality of the premise, this is an entertaining, atmospheric, tongue- in-cheek body count film.Admittedly, nearly all the murders take place offscreen, and the freewheeling vacationers literally begin storing the corpses by-the-numbers in an industrial meat freezer until they are able to fetch the authorities at the weekend's end, but the black humor of the entire situation is subtly implanted by Bava and is genuinely amusing.
The movie doesn't even try to make you care about what's going on; it's like looking at a series of photos of the location that occasionally have dead people in them.There is no on-screen violence that I remember, no nudity except for one scene with Edwige Fenech (who is wasted here) where you might have to squint, and no real reason to watch that I can think of, unless you are a Bava completist..
That said, FIVE DOLLS FOR AN AUGUST MOON isn't one of the director's more highly regarded efforts  except by a few, such as the "Cult Movies" website, which it rates ***1/2 and singles out as his best film!It follows a well-worn thriller premise  a variation on Agatha Christie's "Ten Little Indians" (filmed several times, best of all by Rene' Clair in Hollywood as AND THEN THERE WERE NONE [1945])  with a small cast, an exotic island setting and a welcome tongue-in-cheek approach.
The same, by the way, can be said of Piero Umiliani's score  practically incessant, so as to be almost another character in the film  but which is so delightful (especially the sardonic 'death waltz') that, in fact, this easily emerges as the single best thing about it!Also, Bava seems curiously detached here  apparently, he was reluctant to make it (but did personally edit the film): the murder set-pieces aren't all that memorable (in fact, they mostly occur off-screen), the insufficiently developed plot meanders after a while, and the succession of ironic twists at the end tend to fall flat.
Typically, he over-uses the zoom throughout but does manage one particularly masterful sequence  having the camera follow numerous glass bulbs (thrown off a table in an argument) down a flight of steps to reveal another victim in the bath-tub.The ladies, at least, are lovely  for a Bava film, there's an unusual emphasis on eroticism here  especially Ira Furstenberg and Ely Galleani (whose character is something of an enigma: though her presence is known to the people on the island, she's all but forgotten when the bodies start piling up and, ultimately, proves to be not quite so innocent).
A small group of people come to an island to relax but soon find themselves trapped on the island with a murderer in their midst.I love that the film features Tunisian-born Maurice Poli, who would go on to appear in Bava's "Baron Blood" and star in "Rabid Dogs".
The luscious lady co-stars in this interesting effort from Mario Bava utilizing that old "Ten Little Indians" theme of a group of people being knocked off one at a time.The victims are a group of businessmen - arrogant upper crust jerks all - and their hottie companions who have gathered at an island mansion; the men are determined to make a scientist, Gerry Farrell (William Berger), divulge his formula for an industrial resin.
Most of this ingenious man's films are absolutely brilliant, and although "Five Dolls..." is by far the least interesting Bava film I've seen so far (and in no way comparable to the brilliance of his other gialli), it is definitely a stylish, atmospheric and highly entertaining little macabre thriller coming along with an ingenious jazzy score.The film is about a group of rich people, who have met on an island to have fun and discuss business.
The soundtrack is, as mentioned above, brilliant, and fits in greatly with the movie's macabre sense of humor.Even though "Five Dolls For An August Moon" is definitely one of Mario Bava's weakest suspense films (the weakest I've seen so far), it is definitely a stylish and recommended little film that his fans can not afford to miss.
5 Dolls for an August Moon (1971)** (out of 4) Mario Bava's twist on the "Ten Little Indians" story has a group of people being invited to an isolated island where one by one they're murdered.
Recently talking about Giallo queen Edwige Fenech on IMDbs Classic Film board,I decided that it was time to watch a Fenech Gialli for the first time.Taking a look at a box set of auteur film maker Mario Bava,I spotted a collaboration that he had made with Fenech,which led to me staying up for the August moon.The plot:Wanting to get a breather from work, Professor Gerry Farrell & his wife Trudy decide to join industrialist George Stark and other couples for a "happening" weekend taking place on a remote island.Shortly after things start to flow,Gerry Farrell begins to suspect that he was not invited so that friends could catch up with him,as each of them start to offer bags of cash in exchange for his now formula of industrial resin.Sticking to his principles,Gerry turns down all of the offers.As the men argue among themselves,Stark's wife Jill decides to go for a walk on the beach.Getting stopped in her tracks,Jill finds out that a fellow guest has been left brutally murdered on the beach.As the bodies start to pile up,the surviving guest become increasingly desperate to get Farrell's new formula by any means possible.View on the film:Getting into the spirit of the "happening",director/editor Mario Bava & cinematographer Antonio Rinaldi dazzle with wah-wah whip- pans that give the partying a frenzied atmosphere.
Despite working as a "director for hire" (and being very dismissive about the movie later on)Bava clearly displays an excellent attention to detail for the film,as the blunt murders take place against a whirling psychedelic backdrop,which goes from each of the women wearing lavishly colourful dresses,to the murder scenes being covered in shimmering blood and rolling crystal balls.For the screenplay,writer Mario di Nardo gives the Giallo a satirical Film Noir bite,as Nardo makes all the guests more concerned about getting Farrell's new formula than they are about the bodies stacking up.Digging into the Film Noir root of the Giallo,Nardo fills the weekend guest list with shady femme fatales and smart suited men who would hang anyone out to dry (or in this case on a meat hook!) to get one step ahead in the business world.Whilst the satirical slices give the movie a brittle comedic edge,the casual nature that the characters treat the murders in is sadly reflected in the screenplay,with Nardo paying little attention to building up any clues,and and also treating the murder set pieces in a relaxed manner which withholds any tense atmosphere from them.Looking gorgeous wrapped in eye-catching clothes,the beautiful Edwige Fenech gives a wonderful performance as guest Marie Chaney,whose flirtatious charms are given a femme fatale shine by Fenech,as Chaney tries to wrap all the men around in to giving her what she wants.