Honestly, I was a little confused by 5 Dolls for an August Moon. I'm used to being perplexed by Italian horror, but what I've seen director Mario Bava is usually a bit more straightforward than some of his peers. But it took me a little while to figure out what was going on here. The opening scene of a woman dancing around/laying down and gyrating was (ahem) entertaining, but then she gets fake sacrificed and everybody has a big laugh about it. Huh? I guess if they are just trying to confuse you - then job well done.
My first (and arguably biggest) hurdle was determining how these folks related to each other. There are four couples visiting this island (where the weather has made it impossible to leave), but it took me a good third of the movie to figure out who was with who. There aren't any major identifying characteristics to the characters, and the fact that some of them are kind of sleazy and trying to sleep around with people other than their spouses muddies the waters even more.
The story revolves around 4 guys - one is a scientist who has a very valuable formula for industrial resin, and the other three guys are varying levels of corporate assholes who want to buy it from him. But he isn't interested in selling. Some of the businessmen are backstabbing their partners and offering a higher price to the scientist to sell it to just one of them - we're all familiar with the cutthroat world of industrial resins. Anyways, these guys and their wives are trapped on an island in this fancy-ass house (that one of the businessmen owns) with no contact to the outside world. The wives have little to do besides lounge around in skimpy outfits and get killed. People start getting picked off one by one. Since the island is completely isolated, it must be one of them... but who?
So it's more or less a mystery rather than an outright horror film. And I'm not sure how well it works as a mystery. Things more or less get tied together at the end, but there are a few leaps of faith you have to accept to make it work. I'm never a fan of mystery endings where they give you a bunch of information that you couldn't have possibly known during the big reveal. I prefer to have most of the facts laid out during, you know, the story. But I guess it's no more or less unbelievable/convoluted than its contemporaries.
You can always count on Bava to make a visually interesting film, and 5 Dolls is no exception. The style of dress and set design is nicely 70's groovy - very colorful and pleasing to the eye. Bava stages some nice shots using props in the house (my favorite - hundreds of decorative glass balls rolling down a spiral staircase after a scuffle). And the kitchen has a walk in freezer, where the victim's bodies are stored after they are killed. They are wrapped in plastic and hung like cuts of meat, and Bava lets the camera linger on them from time to time. It's not as gory as it sounds, but it still has a chilling effect. The stark island setting is well used - it provides an interesting contrast to the amazing house where most of the film takes place. Check it out:
Seriously, how cool is that! Obviously there's some forced perspective there, but you get the picture. I probably could have watched a 90-minute tour of the home and been okay with it. I guess that's how I know I'm getting old - I'll take the parade of homes tour over the girls in skimpy outfits.
Also, the film has this weird sort of carnival-esque music on the soundtrack, often highlighted by distorted organ riffs. It's not super upbeat, but it isn't too grim either. You also get some spastic camera zooms/movements. I think the cumulative effect of all this stylishness is supposed to be disorienting, which is fine it it's own right. But it kind of clashes with the story, which isn't disorienting - you need at least a basic understanding of things to get disoriented in the first place. The story here is just tough to crack from the get go.
The characters don't really act like normal human beings (one woman's reaction after several murders have taken place: "we're all a little upset." Really? Just a little?). And there isn't enough information on the characters to make the end result satisfying - particularly the woman who isn't with the rest of the group, who is just sort of hanging out on the island, sitting on a swing, peeping, or scarf-hoarding. Plus, once you figure out that everyone (save maybe one or two) is going to die, there just isn't much tension to the proceedings - the deaths just kind of happen.
Ultimately, I was disappointed in 5 Dolls for an August Moon - and reading up about it, it sounds like there may have been some significant studio interference which affected the final product. It still has some enjoyable style/visual flair, but it was mostly superficial and in the service of a story that just wasn't all that interesting or well-executed.
I would not recommend this film.
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