Sorry to Bother You
How does one accurately describe Boots Riley’s Sorry to Bother You? Just writing my review was a lesson in secrecy, since I attempted to avoid some insane spoilers. In a nutshell, it’s about a man named Cassius Green (Lakeith Stanfield) working as a telemarketer. In this weird, hyper-realistic landscape, Cassius ends up moving up the ladder to a prime “power caller” position and become enmeshed in a series of bizarre events dividing the “haves” and the “have nots.”
Sorry to Bother You is utterly bonkers, but, like The First Purge, exists in a world not too far removed from our own. Case in point, a major corporation run by Steve Lift (Armie Hammer in his best role of the year…sorry, Marty), has a series of communities that appear to be a new form of indentured servitude. How is it any different from the world of Google’s campus? Riley seems to be asking that question — and more.
There is so much social commentary on the nature of work and how the poor and disenfranchised are the first to be utilized as cheap labor for the wealthy. By the time the twist arrives, you’re surprised, but you shouldn’t be, considering the world Riley’s already created for us.