Roth broke through in the early 2000s as part of “the splat pack,” alongside directors like James Wan (“Saw”) and Alexandre Aja (“High Tension”). Their films were dismissed as “torture porn,” and Roth has always been told that his films are “too much.”
But in 2026, after the success of the psychopathic clown Art in Damien Leone's "Terrifier" series, it is easier to get around film censorship and Roth has not had to compromise. He sees the excessive violence in "Ice Cream Man" as completely logical.
The film is about an ice cream man who spikes his frozen treats and turns children into killing machines.
When 100 children hack their teachers to death with axes and play with their entrails - to me, that's exactly what would happen if the children actually got infected and killed the adults, says Eli Roth.
Jump rope of intestines
The idea was born the summer after Roth's debut "Cabin Fever" (2002).
I saw an ice cream truck and thought, "We blindly trust ice cream truck drivers who drive into our neighborhood. What if the music activated some kind of killer trigger in the kids?"
The children's massacres include jumping rope with intestines and making "angels" in blood. Roth is most proud of a scene in which the children pull a body in half as if it were a chewy candy.
"The image of the kids separating the body, it was crazy. Like, you look at it and you think, 'This is sick, I can't believe we're actually doing this,'" says Eli Roth.
Christmas Eve for the children
But how were the children affected by the filming? It was like “Christmas Eve and Halloween in one” for the children, claims Roth.
Children love to be monsters, you don't need to direct them.
Roth, who was a camp leader at a summer camp for three summers in his youth, believes that children are constantly fantasizing and playing and therefore have a natural ability to distinguish fairy tales from reality.
We were shooting a scene where a girl saws off her mother's head, and her actual mother was watching. I thought, 'She's really good at this. She's actually scary.' But when you yell 'cut' they stop and just laugh.
Age: 54 years old (Born April 18, 1972)
Place of birth: Newton, Massachusetts, USA.
Profession: Director, screenwriter, producer, actor.
Selection from the filmography
Director: "Cabin Fever" (2002) "Hostel" (2005) "Hostel: Part II" (2007) "The Green Inferno" (2013) "Knock Knock" (2015) "Death Wish" (2018) "The House with the Clock" (2018), "Thanksgiving" (2023), "Borderlands" (2024).
As an actor: "Inglourious Basterds" (2009) - in the role of Donny "The Bear Jew" Donowitz, "Rock of Ages" (2012).
Currently working with: Director of and actor in "Ice Cream Man", with theatrical release on August 7.
