Eli Roth’s Ice Cream Man Is a ‘Pee-wee’s Playhouse Episode on Crack’ | Interview
Ice Cream Man director and co-writer Eli Roth spoke with ComingSoon’s Tyler Treese about his latest horror movie. Roth discussed the film’s pacing, going all-out with its kills, and how Terrifier influenced the movie. The film is out in theaters nationwide on August 7.
“Ice Cream Man follows an idyllic summer town descending into madness when an ice cream man serves kids sweet delights with horrifying results,” says the official synopsis.
Tyler Treese: Eli, there’s actually no death in the film until about 18 minutes in, and that feels like a slow build in this modern ADHD era we’re in. So many films feel like they have to start with a kill right off the bat. You really make up for it, though. There’s a brutal montage once we get the ball rolling. Can you speak to having that trust in the audience and then just unleashing all havoc once it happens?
Eli Roth: Yeah. I trust the audience is there to have a good time and watch the story. The thing is, once the kids turn, it’s just survival. That’s it.
To me, The Birds is the masterpiece. It’s all these little micro dramas—this one likes this one, this past relationship, Melanie Daniels comes to town, she meets Rod Taylor—and then the birds show up, and none of it matters anymore. All bets are off.
I love movies like that, or Philip Kaufman’s Invasion of the Body Snatchers, where once the turn happens, everything changes. But you’ve got to set up the dynamics first. I love when there are kids who don’t really know each other, don’t like each other, aren’t really friends, and then suddenly they have to band together to figure out what’s going on.
There’s not a lot of real estate to set that up, and everybody knows with me that something’s coming. You want to hold back just enough to tease the audience so that when you finally deliver it, they almost regret having seen the movie.
I want people to think, What have I gotten myself into? It’s like getting on a roller coaster. You wait in line for an hour, you’re excited, and then it starts climbing. You think, Wait, I want to get off. I want that feeling. Then it starts, and it just goes and goes and goes. It’s completely relentless.
I think it’s more gore than I’ve ever put in a movie—certainly more than a few of my movies combined.
You really go all out in this film, similar to Thanksgiving, and you started your career pushing boundaries with movies like Hostel. How has it been going back to that attitude now with everything you’ve learned after being in the industry for decades?
It’s great. It was very freeing. Look at the movies that came out in 1999. Go look up that list. It’s incredible—Eyes Wide Shut, Magnolia, The Sixth Sense, Fight Club. It’s one masterpiece after another.
Back then, my ambition was to make studio movies. Then, after going through that process, every time I pitched a horror idea, someone would say, “You can’t do that. That’s too much,” or, “You have to take that out. We won’t release it.” There’s always somebody telling you to pull back because it has to work for mainstream audiences.
Then you see Terrifier 3 and realize, No, this is what the audience is now. The audience is always ahead of the studios. Damien Leone did a brilliant job with his team. They released that movie, made it a hit, and now theaters aren’t afraid to play unrated movies.
I thought, this is the time to do it. I know how to pull this movie off, and I wanted to get back to my roots—to Cabin Fever and Hostel—movies that felt dangerous. Movies that felt like Green Inferno, completely unhinged, where you can’t believe what you’re watching. It seems like a lunatic made the movie.
With this summer of horror and all these big releases, I want Ice Cream Man to be the cherry on top because it’s so different. I want people to say, “I’ve never seen anything like this.” It’s like a Pee-wee’s Playhouse episode on crack—with blood.
There are some really little kids committing atrocities in this film. How was it directing them to strangle people and do all these wild kills while also making sure the set stayed fun for them?
Eli Roth: It was fun. We were very clear with the parents about what we were doing. The little kid Cole, who holds the principal’s head, is the biggest horror fan. He’s watched Thanksgiving, every episode of The Walking Dead—these kids are savvy. They’re six years old with Art the Clown backpacks. They know what this stuff is.
We explained everything, so anyone who didn’t want to be there wasn’t. The parents are younger than me, and they’re all horror fans too. They loved it. For example, I wanted a scene inspired by the game Operation. The kids who haven’t eaten the ice cream run around a corner, and another group of kids is literally playing Operation on a dead janitor.
I had this little girl using forceps to pull out intestines, and she said, “It’s really sticky.” I said, “No problem, we’ll get someone else.” She goes, “No, no, no. I’ll do it.” She kept looking at the camera. She was six years old. I told her, “Just keep looking at the intestines.”
Her mom was standing nearby because parents have to maintain visual contact, and meanwhile all the other moms are saying, “My daughter will do it! My kid will do it!” Everybody wanted their kid on screen. Then I found out her father was an Italian chef. I said, “I heard your daddy’s a chef.” She said, “Yeah.” I said, “Pretend this is Friday night and these intestines are your dad’s spaghetti that he just pulled out of the pot.” She goes, “Okay.”
Next take, she nailed it. It’s just about relating to kids. Then I said, “Great, we got it. Let’s go home.” I’d ask, “Who wants to do a blood angel?” “Me!” “It’s going to be sticky.” “I don’t care.”
Kids don’t care about being sticky. They’d ask, “Sir, may I have more blood, please?” I’d say, “Would you like more?” “Yes, please.” It was like Oliver Twist. The kids got it way more than the adults did. We had so much fun.
The other thing is, they’re still kids. You’ve got a hundred children lined up in makeup doing this kid apocalypse scene. They’re lined up to get ice cream from the Ice Cream Man, and by law you have to give them breaks every 45 minutes.
So you spend 40-plus minutes getting everybody into position, you finally have two or three minutes to get the take, you roll the camera—and then a bee flies by. Suddenly all the kids yell, “A bee!” That’s it. They all run off. Now the bee is directing your movie. It was hilarious.
I was a camp counselor for many summers, so I love working with big groups of kids. I’m good at wrangling them. I never yell on set. I keep it fun. I keep it light. The kids all went for it. I even asked them, “Do you want me to direct you like children or like adults?” They said, “Talk to us like adults. Don’t talk to us like kids.” So I said, “Okay. Here’s what we’re doing.” They really responded to that.
Thanks to Eli Roth for taking the time to talk about Ice Cream Man. Tickets are now on sale.
Source: Comingsoon.net