Liberal fans and “Free Palestine” freak are threatening to boycott Borat star Sacha Baron Cohen‘s follow-up film for his over-the-top rapper wannabe character Ali G, with the film Ali G: Who Iz I? set to debut in October.
As the Amazon/MGM Studios film barrels toward its debut, left-wing activists are flooding theaters with an email campaign protesting Cohen’s Ali G reboot, calling the dreadlocked character a racist stereotype of black people, according to Variety.
Presented as another one of Cohen’s typical mocumentary-styled comedies, Ali G: Who Iz I? purports to follow the character as he mounts a comeback tour to revitalize his moribund rapping career.
A left-wing group called NewsCord is behind the email campaign to send some 37,000 emails to cinemas and movie houses warning them not to screen the new Ali G film.
“Black British comedians called the character ‘an alibi for racism’ in 2000,” the organization said in a statement. “[British author] Jeanette Winterson asked what separates it from the Black and White Minstrels; Kazakh and Arab organisations documented the harm of the catalogue behind it. Sony Pictures UK is selling it with the line ‘He iz back. We ain’t liable.’ The screens belong to the chains, and a booking is a choice.”
British writer Afua Hirsch added in a post on Substack that the entire character is no longer relevant, anyway. “Black people don’t dress like that anymore. Even white people imitating Black people don’t talk like that anymore. Sexualizing black women and casually mocking working class women is not accepted anymore. Baron Cohen’s so-called ‘humor’ is a crude compound of all these things.”
Cohen clearly expected the attacks on the film and even joked about it on a post on X when he was flogging the film.
“In an age where a comedian’s career can be ended by a single un-PC joke, I thought I’d play it safe and bring this guy back,” he wrote.
Not only is his character wildly out of date and no longer relevant, he also seems a few years behind the times on whether “a single un-PC joke” can ruin a comedian’s career. Those days seem to be a few years in our past, as well.
Regardless, the movie chains in the U.K. who have been the target of this letter-writing campaign do not seem the least bit worried. Not a one has announced that it will bow to the pressure and refuse to screen Cohen’s new film.
Indeed, one chain out of Denmark, theater operators Nordisk Film Biografer (NFBIO), is defending the film.
As Variety notes, the chain issued a statement:
We understand very well that Sacha Baron Cohen’s satire, characters and means have sparked debate over the years, and that a figure like Ali G etc. can be experienced as offensive, problematic or provocative for the individual.
As a cinema, however, it is a fundamental principle for us to present a broad and diverse film program. Film is an art form that ranges from the broadly entertaining to the sharply satirical and controversial. The cinema is a space for many different types of film and here one will inevitably encounter works that provoke, challenge or repel.
We do not consider it our task as a cinema to exercise censorship or to reject films that are legally distributed and aimed at an adult audience, based on discussions about the film’s moral or satirical justification. Here, Sacha Baron Cohen is precisely an artist who divides the waters: Where some experience that all boundaries are crossed, others see a form of satire where no one gets away with it. However, we see no reason to reject his film — just as we do not reject other films that individual guests or groups may think that we should not show. We trust that our audience is able to orient themselves and make an informed choice about which films they want to see or reject.
The hubub that the activists are trying to kick up, though, is probably a waste of time. It seems highly likely that Ali G: Who Iz I? will open on October 23, then fade away without making much of a ripple in film history.
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