‘I Love Boosters’: Irreverent, Beautiful And Brilliant Until The Ending

It has been eight years since the release of Sorry to Bother You, Boots Riley’s Science fiction black comedy which established the musical artist as a strong filmmaker with a distinct voice and style. His second feature film has lofty expectations to live up to his first work. It is then remarkable that Boots has delivered a film full of vibrant energy, strong wit, clever messaging and wonderful absurdity that more than makes it a worthy second film. For the most part.

I Love Boosters is an American absurdist crime comedy film written and directed by Boots Riley. It premiered on Thursday March 12 at the South by Southwest Film & TV Festival and was released theatrically on Friday May 22, 2026. The film takes place in the San Francisco Bay area and follows a group of Boosters known as the Velvet Gang comprised of Corvette, played by Keke Palmer, Mariah, played by Taylour Paige and Sade, played by Naomi Ackie. They routinely shoplift from Metro Designers fashion chain and sell the clothes at a discount to make ends meet. Their plots and heists escalate, coming to the attention of the Metro Designer’s founder Christie Smith, played by Demi Moore. The film also stars Poppy Liu, Eliza Gonzalez, LaKeith Stanfield, Will Poulter and Don Cheadle in supporting roles.

The first thing in this film that will stand out to a viewer is of course the absurdity. The world that the characters inhabit is completely mad and full of strong and stark colours. Each shop from which the velvet Gang steal from are all a single colour or just covered in fur, the buildings are malformed and misshapen, the visuals constantly shift depending on the character’s internal thinking and flashbacks push the boundaries of visual creativity and imagery. This allows the film to insert absurd symbols and ideas without breaking the audience’s immersion. Every creative choice in this film is in service of maintaining this tone and style whilst pushing the film’s anti-capitalist message. The music perfectly complements the action on-screen and the performances from the entire cast are big, bold and memorable.  

Perhaps the most striking aspect visually speaking is the costume design. There is so much variety in the outfits, each one with its own identity and statement about the character of those who wear them. The cinematography perfectly captures every image, and the editing is snappy and efficient, never disorienting the audience and keeping them on track with the ever-escalating absurdity. The visuals as a whole showcase a variety of techniques from odd computer-generated imagery to stop motion. Perhaps the only fault in the technical aspects is the sound mixing. While the soundtrack is excellent, there are numerous instances where the dialogue becomes overwhelmed by the music. There are a few times where this feels intentional but there are others, especially when there are important exposition and character, where the dialogue needs to be heard.

But a film is more than its visuals and Boots supports his visual finesse with a strong, witty script with a fun heist plot. The first half is a series of heists, exploring the main characters’ relationships and ensuring the audience is informed on how this world works. The second half pivots with the introduction of Jianhu, played by Poppy Liu, where her backstory involving worker abuse and exploitation as well as an exploration of identity and community. What was once stealing to make ends meet becomes an act of defiance against the wealthy and the privileged. The screenplay’s excellence becomes clearer when the teleporter gets introduced and all the concepts associated with it. In just a few minutes, Boots gets across all the important information, both in-universe and thematic, to the audience in a clear manner that never feels overwhelming. The overall thematic message is incredibly strong as a result, especially in the third act where the idea of fashion becoming a tool of control and the very body and flesh of a person becomes a part of the fashion is taken to its absurd endpoint in gruesome fashion.

The only times the script falters are in moments where contrivance allows the plot to progress. Nowhere is this more apparent than with Pinky Ring Guy, played by LaKeith Stanfield. He appears in numerous scenes either as a vision or as a real person, but the film never settles on if he is real or not real for the characters. He stands out as underdeveloped since the rest of the film does well to highlight what absurd image is part of the characters’ imagination and what is truly real. The teleporters as well at times feel more like plot devices to simply allow the characters to do what they want without any true opposition. It robs some stretches of the film of tension since the teleporters could potentially remove all danger. There is an extended action sequence in the third act involving the gang escaping which feels dragged out and adds very little to the film thematically, in addition to being devoid of tension.  

The standout in terms of performances is definitely Keke Palmer as protagonist Corvette. Her character arc is by far the most fascinating as she greatly admires Christie, only stealing from her to make ends meet. The audience sees the slow deterioration of her worldview as she sees Christie for the monster and hack that she truly is. Corvette’s noble cause becomes marred by a desire for revenge, pushing forward the idea that simply hurting those in power for selfish gain is not the right way. Only through community and noble intentions can the powerful truly be toppled. These are all aspects that Keke balances in her performance, and she certainly delivers in the comedic moments with great wit. Every member of the cast has excellent chemistry with one another, combining perfect wit and delivery to make the characters likeable. They are far from full three-dimensional, but they do not have to be since the world more than makes up for it. Demi Moore especially does a great job as the film’s antagonist, hamming it up in every scene.

Perhaps the weakest part of the film is its climax. It is by no means bad, but it is rather simple and basic given the film’s commentary. It undercuts the message as the characters use the teleporters to amplify the protests rather than actually make any meaningful change or enact comeuppance against Christie. A film with a strong anti-capitalist message decides to let the evil billionaire, who exploited and killed workers, live. The lack of satisfying comeuppance for Christie ultimately leaves the film on an unsatisfying note which is a great shame given all the film’s excellence. Corvette, however, does get a strong ending, with the symbol of a large ball of bills and junk coming full circle, showing the weight that has been lifted from her shoulders.

Overall, I Love Boosters should be watched at least for its visuals and creativity alone. Boots Riley proves once again he has a knack for strong visuals and witty scripts. The climax and ending do ultimately muddle the strong message, but that is not enough to take away from the fact that this is one of the most creative films of the year, with great performances and technical aspects.