Sorry to Bother You

Starring: LaKeith Stanfield, Tessa Thompson, Jermaine Fowler, Omari Hardwick, Armie Hammer, Danny Glover, Terry Crews, Kate Berlant, Steven Yeun, Robert Longstreet, David Cross (voice), Forest Whitaker, Rosario Dawson (voice), Lily James (voice), Patton Oswalt (voice)
Directed by: Boots Riley
Rating: R
Genre: Comedy, Fantasy, Science Fiction
2018

Times Seen:
Tim: 1

Summary: A telemarketer (LaKeith Stanfield) begins to achieve unexpected success when he uses a "white voice" to connect with those he calls. As he moves away from his personal identity, he builds more and more success at work.

Review:

Tim: You have to give writer/director Boots Riley a ton of credit for the ambition in his directorial debut. Sorry to Bother You certainly never plays it safe as it delivers a powerful message about capitalism, racism, and the sacrifices we make to succeed in this world. It's slightly astonishing what RIley attempted to do here and his brazen attempt deserves applause.

It's difficult to really describe everything that happens here. For much of the movie, it feels like a fairly straightforward examination of the dangers of capitalism when you look at it through different racial classes. This centers around a telemarketing firm. Our protagonist gets hired (in a pretty hilarious interview) and begins his job there. He has aspirations to be a Power Caller, the top employees who make the most amount of money and prestige. He struggles in the job until a coworker teaches him how to use his "white voice". Once he adopts this persona, everything changes for him. That's a fairly clear, damning examination of what it feels like for many African-Americans in today's society. To succeed, you have to adopt a generally agreed upon personality and demeanor. It's a culture that pushes everyone to conformity. Being true to yourself is generally not a good thing in corporate America. It's much more complex than I'm making it out to be, as this anti-captialism sentiment also explores the roles unions play, it looks at the falsity of marketing, televised entertainment, and more. It's all wrapped up in this entertaining but scathing look at modern society.

As thought-provoking as all this is, I haven't even gotten to the Horsepeople yet. I feel like it's better if I don't say too much about this, but this was such a bizarre, hilarious twist. I couldn't believe the audacity of Riley to put something like this into his directorial debut. He had to know it would be polarizing. It's also somewhat brilliant and head-spinning. I'll keep this part of the review short, but it certainly emerges as one of the most memorable aspects of the entire film.

LaKeith Stanfield has been seemingly everywhere in recent years. I really loved his performance on "Atlanta" and he's consistently shown an unbelievable amount of range as an actor. His role here required quite a bit from him and he does it all with aplomb. It's not too much to say that he makes the movie with his everyman performance. He's so relatable that we identify with and support his character, even when he does things we don't agree with. As much as I liked Stanfield before this movie, I became even more of a fan after it.

Tessa Thompson adds a good supporting performance. She's another person who has been popping up quite a lot in recent years and is always effect. She works well here, too. Armie Hammer is terrific in an over-the-top, memorable supporting role. I loved seeing Danny Glover in a small but important role. Steven Yeun gave a great performance, too. I loved his work on "The Walking Dead" and I hope he gets more chances to showcase his skills on the big screen. I'm always happy to see Terry Crews, although I do wish he had more to do. The voice cast is solid, as David Cross, Rosario Dawson, Patton Oswalt, and Lily James might not show up on screen, but add to the movie.

I'm really interested to see what Boots Riley does next. As I mentioned, this was an incredibly ambitious debut film. Riley mostly delivers, but it's obvious he doesn't have all that much experience. There were certainly moments throughout this film that a more experienced director could have pulled more out of. The movie is probably about 10 minutes too long, although that's a minor complaint. Based on this audacious film, I'd suspect Riley will deliver a great movie before too long. As it is, this is an entertaining, thought-provoking first movie and one that I walked away from feeling very impressed.

Rating 1-10
Tim's Rating: 7



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