The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit is a film based on a play written by Ray Bradbury. Bradbury was born in Illinois, but he grew up in East Los Angeles. Growing up in East Los Angeles influenced the plot for his play. Bradbury stated he grew up around Mexicans in East Los Angeles, and witnessed so much poverty. In fact people were so poor it was not uncommon for family members, includnig his own, to share clothes. This is where he came up with the plot for the play (John Cribbs, 2011). In 1974 Stuart Gordon, the director of the film saw the play and wanted to make it a movie, but this did not happen for many years. In 1998 Disney decided to produce the film, but it was given a budget of five million dollars and was released straight to DVD.
The film takes place in Boyle Heights, and is about five men who form a friendship when they all decide to pitch in $20 each to purchase a shiny bright white suit which they all can wear. While it seems odd that five grown men would have to each pitch in $20 to share a suit they have good reason. For starters none of them had $100 of their own to spare, in fact two of the men were facing eviction, and another was homeless. Never the less with the last bit of money each of them had they purchase the suit, which they refer to as “the wonderful ice cream suit.” This is no ordinary suit and it is thought to make the dreams of the wearer come true. While this is not the claim of the shopkeeper, through out the film you see how their dreams, which are nothing extraordinary are fulfilled.
The first night each man gets to wear the suit for one hour…
The first to wear the suit is Dominguez (Esai Morales). Dominguez, is the stereotypical Latino who wants only to be recognized bay all the women in town, he gets his wish and a parade of women follow him while he sings and plays his guitar through Mariachi Plaza.
Next up is Villanazul (Gregory Sierra) who is a poet and has a passion for politics. His dream is for people to listen to his poetry and his political views. While he is wearing the suit he attends a rally where a political figure is speaking, the crowd parts and the speaker steps off his soapbox, and Villanazul takes his place. Villanazul does not speak, yet the crowed applauds. Then the crowd is about to disperse, but Villanazul begins to recite a poem, telling the crowd they need to cross “the river” meaning the LA River, and get out of East Los Angeles. While he is giving his speech scenes are shown of him crossing the LA River, and then the crowd following him into Down Town Los Angeles, which could symbolize the more affluent part if Los Angeles. This scene reminded me of a some of the movies we viewed in class, such as Real Women Have Curves, Born in East LA, and Beverly Hills Chihuahua (my second blog post). It reminded me of these movies because in each of them there are scenes where the Latinos come together and empower each other to embrace who they are, as opposed to assimilating completely into the American culture.
Martinez (Clifton Gonzalez Gonzalez aka Clifton Collins Jr.) is next to wear the suit, and his dream is to be noticed by crush. He goes to her house and stands outside asking the suit to bring the girl to him. She finally comes out and notices something white and bright she puts on her glasses and sees that it is Martinez. She is not only in awe of his suit, but also loves his white smile “with so many teeth.” She agrees to go out with him when he gets to wear the suit again in six days. One interesting fact about Clifton Gonzalez Gonzalez is that he was actually born Collins, and he used Gonzalez Gonzalez to pay respects to his grandfather Pedro Gonzalez Gonzalez, who was a also an actor. This is interesting to me because Clifton did the opposite of what many Latino actors do, he changed his name to sound more Latin as opposed changing to sound more American.
Gomez (Joe Mantegna) who also falls into a stereotypical Latino male, because he is a conman, wears the suit next. Technically he has no dream, but his intention is to runway from Los Angeles and run off to El Paso with the suit. When he is on his way to the bus station he realizes he is in the wrong and decides to go back to his friends. Mantegna was the only one out of the five who was not actually Latin in real life, and I must say his acting and accent did show this. His acting reminded me of West Side Story his accent was overly done, and he was also painted in “brown face.” Mantegna was in the original play, so perhaps that is the reason he was cast in this role.
Last to wear the suit is Vamanos (Edward James Olmos) who is the homeless. Vamanos is cleaned of all his filth and placed into the suit. This character posses many stereotypes of Latino males, he is wild, clumsy, smokes drinks and loves to eat greasy tacos. For fear he will ruin the suit he is the only one who is given as set of rules to follow. He is told not to fall down, not to smoke, not to drink, not to eat greasy tacos, and not to go see fat Ruby (Liz Torres) at the Red Rooster because she wears to much makeup (which are stereotypes of Latinas) and it may get on the suit. Vamanos breaks every rule and it seems the suit will be ruined but in the end it is saved.
The film displays many the typical stereotypes of Latinos, which include poverty stricken, conmen, smokers, drinkers, taco eaters, and who care about nothing else but women. While the suit really had no powers it seems to make each of the men so invincible that all of his dreams come true. Which brings the question of do clothes really make you feel different? Martinez says they do and and says with the suit they can be whoever they want, and they are the ones giving the orders, he also says it will be sad if they ever get rich because they will all have their own suits, and their friendship will not be the same.
This film sounds interesting. The character is right, when everyone gets their own suit life becomes different and the friendships are not the same. It never ceases to amaze me how resourceful people with no money are. Those that put their mind to eat can easily feed large families and keep a roof over their heads. The sharing of the suit to me means that this group of men are resourceful and are sharing resources to get through the hard times.
I actually really enjoyed reading this. I want to watch the film now. It definitely reminds me of the film “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants”. From your post, I was really expecting the characters to all get happy endings but I can see that was not the case. I really love Bradbury’s work but I am interested in knowing why he chose such different personalities for the friends. As you said a few of them did adhere to the stereotypical ideas of Mexicans, and the individuals who possessed the most negative stereotypes (like the conman, or the drunk) did not seem to benefit from the suit at all. I am wondering if Bradbury had a specific purpose for this.
Your film sounds fun to watch. Although the characters are going through a bit of hardship in their lives they seem to come together and find away to carry out their wanting with this special suit. I relate that to social media, sort of. Hiding behind a computer can boost confidence in one to take the same actions. But here is another movie directed with Latin stereotypes. I wonder would the film not be as believable or match the Latin characters if they changed up the stereotypes. I’ve never heard of this movie before but now interested in some good laughs.
I’ve never heard of this movie either. I was also very surprised that Bradbury grew up in East Los Angeles. You mentioned the Latino stereotypes of the characters and the expectations of each friend who wore the suit. I feel the moral of the story is you can be whatever you want to be. The suit was like a lucky charm to each wearer. Some people just need a little talisman to give them that confidence that they already possess, they just don’t know it. I also will try to find this movie and view it.
I never in my life imagined a movie that degrades people from Boyle Heights as this one does. As a former resident of BH, we experienced poverty but not to that level. As teenagers we would borrow each others cloths to go out and party, but not because we were deprived. The corny accents did not help the actors sound believable. Why did the suit have to be white and not black? Are we that flashy or are we getting baptized. This film depicts Mexicans from Boyle Heights as a low members of society. I am not surprised Disney had something to do with this movie, but Edward James Olmos to star in makes me wonder. Some stereotypes are true. Love me some tacos and i know plenty of drunks.