History Film / FiveDollsForAnAugustMoon

* ExecutiveMeddling: Creator/MarioBava was hired to direct the film after it had already been cast. When he asked for time to do rewrites and make some changes of his own, the studio declined and forced him to shoot the film as-written, with actors that weren't of his choosing. Because he had little hand in the film's conception, he played around with camera flourishes, cut down any nudity, and had virtually all the murders take place off-screen. He also changed the ending to the epilogue which was filmed. He enjoyed the experience of working with Teodoro Corra enough to cast him in a later film, but he largely hated the experience because he had little to no creative control, and ranked it among one of his worst films, and one he did purely for the money.

''Five Dolls for an August Moon'' (''5 bambole per la luna d'agosto'') is a 1970 Italian {{giallo}} film directed by Italian horror auteur Creator/MarioBava starring Ira Furstenberg, William Berger, Edwige Fenech, Howard Ross, and Teodoro Corra. The plot is an Agatha Christie-style murder mystery inspired by ''Literature/TenLittleIndians'' about party-goers staying on the private island of rich industrialist George Stark (Corra.) Two of the guests are Prof. Farrell (Berger) and his wife, (von Fürstenberg) who have been invited to the island in an attempt to get Farrell to sell a formula for industrial resin. Other potential buyers for the formula are Jack, (Ross) and Nick (Maurice Poli.) Rounding out the group are Jack's wife, Peggy (Helena Ronee,) Nick's wife, Marie (Fenech) George's wife, Jill (Edith Meloni) the island caretaker's daughter, Isabelle (Justine Gall,) and George's butler, Charles, (Mauro Bosco.) As the booze-filled partying, back-stabbing wheeling and dealing, and secret affairs go on, the guests are gradually killed one-by-one and the survivors must figure out which among them is the killer before they are killed next.

* RecycledPremise: One of the issues that Creator/MarioBava had with the script was that it was mainly a rehash of Film/AndThenThereWereNone with different characters, an updated and slightly different setting, and no credit for Christie.

* VisualTitleDrop: The bodies collecting in George's freezer are the "five dolls" of the title. The survivors end up putting in a total of five before it's down to three of them.

* FinalGirl: Subverted. [[spoiler: It seems Trudy is going to be this, until we discover she was part of his plan the whole time. The actual final girl is Isabelle, but she's not hardly involved at all in the main narrative of the film, only having limited interactions with the main party. She doesn't really join the narrative until the very end, when she sneaks into George's house after Jack and Trudy have turned on each other and killed each other, and steals the cashier's checks. She also attempts to steal the resin formula, but gets scared off when Jack pulls an AlmostDeadGuy on her and grabs her hand before expiring completely.]]

* JerkAss: Both Nick and George have elements of this. Nick prostitutes his wife out for business endeavors, and George isn't very nice to his own wife.
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: [[spoiler: Prof. Farrell. Left on death row for murdering his partner in creating the resin formula, Isabelle meets him and reveals that she can't cash the last million dollar check that Nick brought because it has a pin number she doesn't know. Farrell does know it, and gives it to her so she can collect the last million.]]

* MasterActor: [[spoiler: Jack. He arranges for his wife to be murdered while he's present to give himself an alibi and does a damn fine job of selling his grief about it.]]
* MindScrew: After the party has been reduced to four people, [[spoiler: And Nick has left in a huff, Jack, Trudy, and George pass out in George's messy living room. The screen dissolves, and then the living room is entirely clean, the trio are missing, and seemingly in an alternate universe, the crew of George's main yacht show up, think everyone is gone, and then leave. The screen dissolves again, and Jack, Trudy, and George are back in their original positions in the messy living room. Apparently, this was not a freak event. Jack and Trudy, in cahoots, moved George, cleaned everything up, Jack killed Nick, and then the pair of them hid until the outside crew left, then reset everything. How they managed to pull it off so effectively is left to the viewer's imagination. Trudy even has the nerve to play back George's tape recorder, which had been running since she recorded her prior message, and they hear the crew come in and speak, and Jack and Trudy play confused as to how the crew managed to miss them. When Jack and Trudy are revealed as in cahoots, it makes slightly more sense since it would have taken both of them to clean up and reset everything.]]

''Five Dolls for an August Moon'' (''5 bambole per la luna d'agosto'') is a 1970 Italian {{giallo}} film directed by Italian horror auteur Creator/MarioBava starring Ira Furstenberg, William Berger, Edwige Fenech and Howard Ross. The plot is an Agatha Christie-style murder mystery inspired by ''Literature/TenLittleIndians'' about party-goers staying on the private island of a rich industrialist who are gradually killed one-by-one and must figure out which among them is the killer.

* RecycledPremise: One of the issues that Creator/MarioBava had with the script was that it was mainly a rehash of AndThenThereWereNone with different characters, an updated and slightly different setting, and no credit for Christie.

* TheReveal: [[spoiler: Jack, who it seems couldn't be the killer, due to him being in the room when his wife peggy was killed, actually IS the killer. He killed everyone BUT Peggy, and gloats that he was going to set up George to take the fall before George discovered too much and Jack kills him.]]

** Also, the entire party, in general. After the first murder, Prof. Farrell is the only one who raises much of an issue, and relents when it seems they can't escape. Most of the guests seem to view the continued murders as a distraction from their boozy partying, and from George, Jack, and Nick trying to buy-off Farrell for his formula.

* BrutalBrawl: After [[spoiler: the death of and Nick's wife Marie, Nick accuses George of murdering her, which escalates into a brutal brawl between the pair that sees lots of destroyed furnishings, leading to the surprise reveal of George's wife, Jill, apparently having committed suicide.