A scene from “Ice Cream Man.”
The Horror Section/Valerie Flores
Ice Cream Man, director Eli Roth’s debut film from his new independent movie company The Horror Section, is coming to digital streaming this week after a limited theatrical run.
Released in theaters on Aug. 7, Ice Cream Man stars Ari Millen (Orphan Black) as the title character, an ice cream truck vendor whose trip to an idyllic town in the summertime turns to complete chaos when children in the community resort to murderous mayhem after consuming his cold confections.
Roth also stars in Ice Cream Man alongside Benjamin Byron Davis, Karen Cliche, Dylan Hawco, Sarah Abbott, Shiloh O’Reilly, Kiori Mirza Waldman, Charlie Zeltzer and Charlie Storey.
After Roth suffered a career setback in 2024 when his movie adaptation of the classic video game Borderlands flopped in theaters, the veteran filmmaker and actor helped form The Horror Section as a way to bypass studio interference in his work and avoid cuts from the Motion Picture Association. As such, Roth was able to release Ice Cream Man as an unrated film through a distribution agreement with Iconic Events Releasing, and was able to open the film in 1,671 theaters domestically.
Discussing the reasons he decided to form The Horror Section with his partners, Roth told The Hollywood Reporter in early August that he’s never had fights with the MPA or studios, but just differences of opinion.
“The MPA adjusts with the tastes of the times, so I’ve had an amazing experience, and a really good open dialogue, with them,” Roth recalled for THR. “It was never a fight with the studios, but there were always disagreements that were impossible to prove. Someone would say, ‘Take this out. It’s going to offend audiences.’ And I’d say, ‘No, when you go to see this movie, you want to be shocked and offended.’ Sometimes, it’d be gore, and sometimes it’d be language.
“For Ice Cream Man, I didn’t want to have to deal with that,” Roth added. “I wanted to make something that’s pure and raw and from my head.”
With Ice Cream Man, Roth — whose horror film credits include such horror hits as Cabin Fever, Hostel and its sequel, The Green Inferno and Thanksgiving — said he was motivated to prove that he could have a horror movie with children as the driving force in the splatter scenes.
Eli Roth in “Ice Cream Man.”
The Horror Section
“I wrote this movie with Noah Belson in 2003, and for years, people would read it and go, ‘You can’t do this. You can’t ask children to even perform these scenes. This is too insane,’” Roth told THR. “And I’d say, ‘No, kids love gore. They love Halloween. I want to make this the craziest movie I’ve ever done.”
As for getting an unrated film in theaters— something large exhibitors generally stay away from — Roth noted for THR that since Terrifier 3 opened to about $20 million at the box office in 2024, “all of a sudden, AMC, Regal, Cinemark and all the chains said, ‘Yeah, we will play an unrated movie.’”
During its 10-day theatrical run, Ice Cream Man earned $2.8 million in domestic ticket sales and nearly $3.2 million in international ticket sales for a worldwide box office tally of $6 million against a $5.5 million production budget, per Variety, before prints and advertising costs.
Now, just over a month after the film ended its run in theaters, Ice Cream Man will be rolling into the home video marketplace.
‘Ice Cream Man’ Arrives On PVOD On Tuesday
Ice Cream Man will make its debut on digital streaming via premium video on demand on Tuesday, Sept. 22, a new listing on Prime Video confirms.
In addition to Prime Video, Ice Cream Man will be available for purchase on such digital platforms as Apple TV, Fandango at Home and YouTube Movies & TV for $19.99. Since digital rentals are typically $5 less than purchase prices, viewers can expect to rent Ice Cream Man for $14.99 for 48 hours.
Ice Cream Man was splattered with a “rotten” critics’ score of 25% on Rotten Tomatoes’ Tomatometer based on 124 reviews. While audiences weren’t as brutal, the film still was deemed “rotten” with a 46% score on RT’s Popcornmeter based on 100-plus reviews.
RT’s Critics Consensus for the Roth’s latest movie reads, “Ice Cream Man mistakes self-aware excess for subversion, serving up an increasingly uninspired splatterfest whose half-melted social commentary can’t disguise how little nutritional value lies beneath its gore.”
In a slightly less damaging take, the film’s Audience Summary on RT reads, “Horror nerds may appreciate the commitment to gore, but with its lack of direction and a subpar script, Ice Cream Man lands more silly than sinister.”
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