Director Eli Roth has founded his own independent distribution outfit, The Horror Section, after growing frustrated with studio interference on his $120 million video game adaptation "Borderlands," which was watered down to secure a PG-13 rating and subsequently flopped with critics and audiences in 2024. His new low-budget horror film "Ice Cream Man," about children turned homicidal after eating ice cream, marks his return to the ultraviolent style that made his name with films such as "Hostel" and "The Green Inferno," made entirely without studio oversight.

Roth raised the film's $5.5 million budget largely through foreign pre-sales and Canadian tax credits, and expects it to turn a profit if it earns between $6 million and $8 million at the box office, relying on cheap digital marketing and publicity stunts rather than a big studio spend. "Ice Cream Man" opens on 7 August, with The Horror Section planning to release two to four horror films a year, including the slasher "Stiletto" this autumn and an upcoming project with Snoop Dogg, each given roughly 45-day theatrical runs.