I'm a fan of horror and slasher films. I've seen plenty, from Scream to House of Wax, Candyman, and Chucky. I don't think Ice Cream Man is good enough, and I have my reasons.
The children: YEA, IT'S A NO. My biggest problem is the use of young children in such gruesome scenes. These are the kind of scenes you wouldn't want an eight- or ten-year-old watching on television, yet kids of about five or six are the ones holding hammers and chainsaws. I honestly don't get what the director was trying to achieve by putting them at the centre of all this. A child's brain is still developing, and intense imagery can affect children very differently from adults. I think the film would have worked better with teenagers or people in their early twenties.
Even as an adult, I found some scenes horrific enough to give me nightmares.
The plot: I've watched this film four or five times, and I still struggle to explain what the plot is really about.
According to writer and director Eli Roth, it's a revenge story. Jonathan Smiley (Ari Millen), an ice cream man in Bayleen Bay, is sentenced to death for a crime he didn't commit after children from wealthy families testify against him. He makes a deal with a necromancer: his life in exchange for revenge. Decades later, he comes back from the dead and uses some kind of demonic substance to turn the town's children against the families who accused him.
That much I can follow. Where it falls apart for me is what happens once the children become part of the killings.
The ending was particularly disappointing: Jared and Lizzie, instructed by the priest to stab the necromancer and siren in an unmarked grave, unwittingly kill their own parents. The priest, later revealed as the necromancer, manipulated them into completing his task. And then what? Nobody manages to stop the Ice Cream Man, and the children are never freed from whatever possession they're under. I don't understand what the film was trying to say. Was it justifying everything he did? We've seen even more gruesome horror movies with satisfying endings, but this one just feels like a bad twist with no payoff.
What works and what doesn't for me: Give credit where it's due: the visual effects are excellent. The killings and chopped bodies look quite real, and the VFX and special-effects teams deserve praise for that.
The acting, though, didn't impress me. The performances felt a bit off and didn't meet the expectations I had going in.
Ice Cream Man lacks what a horror film is supposed to deliver: tension, a story that makes sense, and a satisfying ending. The use of children in the violence makes it even harder to enjoy.
Hell no. I wouldn't watch this again.
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