WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM

The tranquility of a sleepy American provincial town is disrupted by a series of inexplicable disappearances involving several family fathers. Layne begins to fear for his safety because everyone who has vanished belonged to a sort of "gang" that he himself was part of as a boy. Moreover, the start of the mysterious disappearances coincides with the appearance in town of a strange ice cream truck that brings back to Layne's mind an episode that marked his childhood and that of the "gang" members; indeed, the children caused the death of Buster, a mentally retarded clown ice cream man who had become the mascot of all the children in the country. Layne thinks that Buster has returned from beyond the grave to exact his revenge. "Masters of Horror" is a unique project conceived by Mick Garris, a director known in the horror field primarily for his adaptations of Stephen King's novels. Garris brought together the most representative horror film directors in a project for cable TV Showtime and home video, resulting in "Masters of Horror," a series of 13 half-hour films, each directed by a major figure in the genre; each episode has a budget of $1.8 million, the location set in the Canadian city of Vancouver, and complete creative freedom was granted to each director. The names involved in the second season of this project are: Tobe Hooper, Dario Argento, Stuart Gordon, Joe Dante, John Carpenter, John Landis, Ernest Dickerson, Brand Anderson, Tom Holland, Peter Medak, Rob Schmidt, Norio Tsuruta, and Mick Garris himself. The tenth episode of the second season of "Masters of Horror" sees the return of Tom Holland behind the camera, a director who in the 1980s delighted us with irresistible cult films that marked the history of the genre such as "Fright Night" and "Child's Play." Holland's recent feature films have seen him involved in adaptations of King's works such as the television film "The Langoliers" and "Thinner"; and it is precisely by looking at the universe of the writer from Maine that the director has brought to life the screenplay of the splatter-punk writer David J. Schow ("Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3," "The Crow"), who in turn adapted the story by horror writer John Farris "I scream, you scream, we all scream for ice cream." But the result is not one of the most flattering, and "The Scream Team" settles among the mediocre works of this second season of the TV series. Holland blends with little originality the typical atmosphere of Stephen King's stories with some well-known and lesser-known figures from the horror cinematic universe, creating a sort of pastiche of little effect. The small community shaken by a malevolent entity that returns from the past and preys on the children of then, now grown up, pays a substantial toll to "Nightmare," "Sometimes They Come Back," and above all "It"; if we add that this creature has the appearance of a disturbing clown, the shadow of "It" becomes even more invasive. Do you remember a small and not very famous horror film from the 1990s called "I Scream, You Scream"? Well, the film, frequently featured on the summer schedule of the then "Notte Horror," saw Clint Howard in the role of an ice cream man with a few screws loose who kidnaps children and kills those who make fun of him, a character who was certainly the inspiration for this "The Scream Team." If we go further back in memory and return to the 1980s, we find "The Stuff - The Killer Ice Cream," in which the beloved summer sweet had unimaginable side effects. In short, the originality is nil, and the overall result of the half-hour film is mediocre. William Forsythe, whom you will remember in the role of Sheriff Wydell in "The Devil's Rejects" and as Michael's stepfather in "Halloween - The Beginning," is here called upon to wear the colorful costume of the disturbing clown zombie, a boogeyman not entirely successful but nevertheless well portrayed by the imposing stature of the actor. In the role of the protagonist is an anonymous Lee Tergesen ("Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning"), an unwitting culprit who finds himself fearing his own children in the most innocent actions, such as eating an ice cream. The idea of the "voodoo ice cream," in its strangeness, is one of the most successful aspects of the film, and, as usual, the special effects of the Berger and Nicotero team are excellent: this time we can admire a disgusting scene of body melting, meticulously shown in every step... a pity that this time when they would surely have been "functional," the special effects and atrocities are relegated to a very marginal role. Therefore, "The Scream Team" is certainly a watchable film but uninspired and ultimately not very successful; perhaps by taking more risks, a more memorable result could have been achieved.