(CREDIT: Magnolia Pictures; The Horror Section/Screenshot)

Late Fame

Starring: Willem Dafoe, Greta Lee, Edmund Donovan, Clay Singer, Luca Padovan, Graham Campbell, Arthur Langlie, Jake Lacy, Tony Torn, Clark Johnson

Director: Kent Jones

Running Time: 97 Minutes

Rating: Unrated

Release Date: August 7, 2026 (Theaters)

Ice Cream Man

Starring: Ari Millen, Charlie Zeltzer, Shiloh O’Reilly, Kiori Mirza Waldman, Sarah Abbott, Benjamin Byron Davis, Dylan Hawco, Karen Cliche, Eli Roth, Darrin Barker, Rodrigo Fernandez-Stoll, Charlie Storey, Luke Dietz

Director: Eli Roth

Running Time: 86 Minutes

Rating: Unrated

Release Date: August 7, 2026 (Theaters)

As it turns out, I recently saw a couple of movies on back-to-back days that both featured a character who had me going, “Hey, what’s that guy doing?” In Late Fame, Willem Dafoe plays Ed Saxberger, a postal worker who decades ago published a book of poetry that is now being rediscovered by an absurdly pretentious group of young writers. After hanging out with them, Ed eventually starts acting rather arrogantly himself, which had me going, “Hey, what are you doing, guy?”

As for Ice Cream Man, it features exactly what you’d expect from a movie directed by Eli Roth with this subject matter. Which is to say, the titular truck driver offers sweets that turn children into possessed killers of all the adults in their town. To which I simply must say: “Hey, guy! What’s all this that you’re doing?” Well, as we eventually discover, he actually does have an understandable motivation. Not enough to justify murder, of course, but certainly enough to justify a horror movie premise. So yeah, in conclusion, what a surprisingly effective double feature.

Grades:
Late Fame: 70 Poems out of 53 Readings
Ice Cream Man: 4 Necromancers out of 9 Sprinkles