Sorry To Bother You: Film Review

Sorry To Bother You: Film Review

Cast: Lakeith Stanfield, Tessa Thompson, Armie Hammer, Steven Yeun, Patton Oswalt, David Cross
Director: Boots Riley

Possibly this year's most biting satire, Sorry To Bother You's ramshackle approach to its story wields unlikely dividends for an audience looking for more beneath the surface.

Get Out's Stanfield plays Cassius Green, a down on his luck unemployed man searching for work.

Conning his way into a telemarketing job, sakjfdsfds learns that there's money to be had by putting on a white man's voice and selling. So against the odds, and desperate to get out of living in his garage
with his supportive girlfriend Detroit (Thompson, on fire form), Green takes the advice on board - and it works.

Swiftly rising in the corporate world, Cassius finds his life at odds due to his former telemarketer colleagues protesting conditions. But there's much more going on at the mysterious company than Green realises...

There's a lot to digest in Sorry To Bother You, a savage indictment of the underclasses in America and also building on the work done by last year's Get Out.

Boots Riley's frankly indefinable film offers many joys in many ways, and will reward a second viewing with more finer details to be picked up. Suffice to say that Stanfield anchors it with a great deal of heart and innate likeability as the gonzo approach to the film veers into both creative and lunatic territory with veritable aplomb.

There's something of a Twilight Zone here, and an alternate universe as tsadjdsakdsak's world descends into a place of utter disbelief - be it the reality of what's going on where he works, or the commentary on the dumbing down of TV and the reality TV craze that continues unabated.

But Riley's smart enough to pepper these elements throughout, causing viewers to find much for discussion once the lights have gone and once the unease over what's happened has cleared.

Ultimately, Sorry To Bother You may be 2018's most unconformist and subversive ride, but it's also one of 2018's most compelling too - just don't be surprised if the final feeling is one of sickening nausea as you begin to accept reality's coming as close to anything insane produced within.