5 Card Stud is a 1968 American Western mystery film directed by Henry Hathaway and starring Dean Martin and Robert Mitchum. The script is based on a novel by Ray Gaulden and was written by Marguerite Roberts.
When a card cheat is secretly lynched, the five men responsible all start turning up strangled by various grisly methods. Gambler Van Morgan (Martin) tried to stop the lynching, which came about mostly because of Nick Evers (Roddy McDowall), an unlikable sort who thinks that one of the lynchers is killing the rest to eliminate witnesses to the crime. Van sticks around to sort out the mess personally, as a pair of newcomers get the attention of the town: Lily Langford (Inger Stevens), a madam who uses a barbershop for a front; and the Reverend Johnathan Rudd (Mitchum) a gun-toting preacher not above using his six-shooters to fill his church.
Tropes:
- Avenging the Villain: After a card shark is caught cheating, he is taken out and lynched by the drunkards he was playing against. Soon afterwards, the men who were in the lynch mob start being murdered, one after another; all by hanging, strangling, or smothering.
- Badass Preacher: Reverend Johnathan Rudd is a gun-toting preacher not above using his six-shooters to fill his church.
- Betty and Veronica: Protagonist Van Morgan has two Love Interests: brunette rancher's daughter Nora (Betty) and blonde Miss Kitty Lily who runs a barbershop-cum-bordello (Veronica). At the end of the movie, Van chooses Lily, realizing that they fit better together, and that neither of them is under any illusions about who the other is.
- Book Safe: When Nick Evers is holding Reverend Johnathan Rudd at gunpoint, he starts reading from the Bible. Opening to a particular page, he pulls out a derringer he has hidden in the hollowed out pages and shoots Nick.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: The killer's first four victims are smothered in a flour barrel, garrotted with barbed wire, hanged by the bell rope in the church, and drowned in a horse trough.
- Disarm, Disassemble, Destroy: Some gold miners are concerned that there's a killer loose and the marshal can't or won't do anything about it, so they march towards the marshal's office, one of them carrying a rifle, intent on taking the law into their own hands. One of the marshal's deputies accosts them, takes the rifle, and empties it of shells. He then asks the miner what he will do if he returns the rifle to him. When the miner says he will reload it and continue on to the marshal's office, the deputy smashes the rifle against the side of a building before handing the remains back to him.
- Disproportionate Retribution: After a card shark is caught cheating, he is taken out and lynched by the drunkards he was playing against. As Van Morgan says as he chases after the mob in an attempt to stop them, you run tinhorns out of town; you don't hang them.
- "Do It Yourself" Theme Tune: Dean Martin sings the title song.
- Gotta Kill Them All: After a card shark is caught cheating, he is taken out and lynched by the drunkards he was playing against. Soon afterwards, the men who were in the lynch mob start being murdered, one after another; all by hanging, strangling, or smothering.
- Dying Clue: After being shot through the stomach, Little George puts his hands together as if praying and holds them like that as he dies. When Van sees the body, he realises that George, who was an atheist, would not have been praying for his life, and was leaving him a clue to tell him that the killer was Reverend Johnathan Rudd.
- Empty Chair Memorial: A Serial Killer is murdering everyone who was involved in a poker game that ended in a man's death. After each player is killed, those remaining tip their seat at the poker table forward so it leans against the table. When Van Morgan, the last survivor, goes to confront the killer, he says:Van Morgan: Wanna do me a favor Mama?
Mama Malone: Depends.
Van Morgan: If I'm not back by dark, will you flip that last chair up? - For Doom the Bell Tolls: Van Morgan and Reverend Jonathan Rudd are having a charged conversation on the street in the early hours of the morning when a gust of wind blows the church doors open and the church bell starts tolling in an uneven rhythm. They both look at the church as Marshal Al Dana goes to the doors and looks in. He then calls for them to come and help him. When they get there, they find Mace Jones hanging dead from the bell rope; the weight of his body ringing the bell as it jerks up and down.
- Farmer's Daughter: Van Morgan's girlfriend at the start of the film is Nora Evers: the daughter of rancher Sig Evers and a Girl Next Door type. She is Betty to Miss Kitty Lily' Veronica in Van's Betty and Veronica dilemma.
- Gambling Brawl: The plot kicks off when a stranger is caught cheating in a poker game and is lynched by the drunken locals he is playing against.
- It's All About Me: Nick Evers:
I got just one rule. Me first, nobody second!
- Miss Kitty: Lily Langford is a madam who uses a barbershop for a front.
- Poetic Serial Killer: A killer is picking off members of lynch party who hanged a card cheat. The first four all die by asphyxiation reflecting the way the man they lynched died. The first is smothered in a flour barrel; the second is garrotted with barbed wire; the third hanged from the church bell rope; and the fourth drowned in a horse trough.
- Pistol-Whipping: When Van Morgan rides up and tries to stop the lynching, Nick Evers coldcocks him with a pistol to stop him.
- Prayer Pose: Little George is found dead with his hands clasped in prayer, which is thought oddly uncharacteristic.
- Professional Gambler: Van Morgan is a professional gambler who runs a little card game in town but one night things get out of hand. A stranger amateurishly tries to cheat and, though Morgan tries to stop it, his fellow players string him up. Morgan leaves town but returns when he hears that the other players are being killed off one by one.
- Rushed Inverted Reading: When Van confronts the killer, the killer asks to finish reading a psalm from the Bible: intending to pull a derringer from the Book Safe. However, in his hurry to get to the gun, he opens the Bible upside down and Van realises what is happening.
- Shovel Strike: During their fight in the graveyard, Nick grabs the shovel that had been used to dig Mace's grave and hits Van with it.
- "Shut Up!" Gunshot: When no one notices his entrance to the saloon, Badass Preacher Johnathan Rudd fires several shots into the floor to get their attention and invite them to church.
- Sinister Minister: Reverend Johnathan Rudd is a gun-toting Badass Preacher with a mysterious past. He is also the murderer.
- What a Drag: Marshal Al Dana gets shot and falls off his horse. As he does so, his foot gets caught in the stirrup and he gets dragged along behind the horse.
