SORRY TO BOTHER YOU

Director: Boots Riley.

2018, 102, R

Screenwriter: Boots Riley

Cast: Lakeith Stanfield, Tessa Thompson, Armie Hammer, Steven Yeun, Terry Crews.

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Oakland is having its moment, with two exciting films set in the city, with its thriving hip-hop culture (see Blindspotting on current flyer). The surreal satire by rapper/activist Boots Riley begins as nice-kid-with-an-Afro Cassius Green (Lakeith Stanfield) gets a job at a telemarketing company. Sales are dismal until he takes the advice of a co-worker played by Danny Glover: “Use your white voice.” Soon Cassius and his artist girlfriend (Tessa Thompson of Westworld and Thor: Ragnarok) are living large. But when Cassius not only becomes an internet star, but figures out what the company is selling, living dangerously becomes a gazillion times more apt. Worth seeing, if only for the spectacle of Armie Hammer in a sarong…
“Knocks your socks off, tickles your bare tootsies with goose feathers, ultimately taking a sledgehammer to your kneecaps. What, there’s no category on Netflix for movies like that?” Peter DeBruge, Variety.