Amazon MGM Studios released “Ali G: Who Iz I?” in theaters on Friday, October 23rd, for one weekend only. Sacha Baron Cohen directs for the first time and plays Ali G, the Staines rude boy who debuted on Channel 4 in 1998. Cohen also plays two more characters, and all three go after real people who are not in on the joke. The film is rated R and runs 89 minutes. It opens with a quote from Voltaire about absurdities and atrocities. Prime Video comes next, though Deadline says no streaming date has been announced. Morgana Robinson takes over the role of Ali’s girlfriend Julie, which Kellie Bright played in “Ali G Indahouse” in 2002.
The reviews arrived ahead of opening day and could not agree on anything. Deadline’s critic wrote “yes I did laugh a lot”, The Jewish Chronicle gave it four stars and The Arts Desk called Ali G “an unexpectedly sharp satirical weapon”. On the other side, Variety called the film “dawdling and cumbersome”, TheWrap called it “a dispiriting and painfully humorless affair” and The Globe and Mail went with “laugh-free” in its headline. The split is less about whether the film shocks than about whether shocking people still means anything. Warning beyond this point there are spoilers for all of “Ali G: Who Iz I?”, including the ending.
The split is less about whether the film shocks than about whether shocking people still means anything.”
Ali G starts out broke and living in Staines. His girlfriend Julie is heavily pregnant, and he has been out of work since “Da Ali G Show” ended on HBO in 2004. While he tries to sell his old fax machine, a message spits out of it with an offer from HBO for another season. The Guardian, TheWrap and Time Out all describe this fax. Ali and Julie fly to Los Angeles, where, TheWrap says, they learn the offer expired 22 years earlier. There is no show and no money. The baby is still on the way.
The first half is a run of loose bits with real people. Ali runs up a $12,000 dinner bill with his show business “team,” according to The Hollywood Reporter and Deadline, and then learns HBO is not paying. He and Julie tour a mansion with a realtor. Consequence of Sound says the couple use him as a go-between for a fight, and Empire calls him “a polite and remarkably chill estate agent” who is a welcome relief. Ali also decides he is the son of the rapper A$AP Rocky, a plot thread that Variety, Time Out and The Hollywood Reporter all mention. A scene in a liquor store, in which he swallows over-the-counter pills and the effects show, turns up in reviews from Variety, Deadline and The Hollywood Reporter.
Cohen’s second character is Dr. Nira Cain-N’Degeocello, a left-wing professor from his Showtime series “Who Is America?” who wants Ali G canceled for cultural appropriation. The Guardian calls him the self-appointed scourge of the practice. He lectures a room of Black community members, and Deadline says most of them walk out. He also pitches a “Compulsory Gender Reversal Year” to an audience that does not know it is a joke, according to The Hollywood Reporter and Deadline. Ali later shows a group of religious leaders an AI-made apology video featuring Nelson Mandela, Tupac Shakur and The Notorious B.I.G., and TheWrap says most of them walk out. The Daily Beast and Film-Authority.com call the video a high point. TheWrap’s critic says the rapping Mandela bit was one of only two times the critic laughed out loud at the press screening.
The third character is Colonel Erran Morad, a former Mossad agent from the same series. Nira hires him to stop Ali. Erran recruits volunteers whom The Guardian and Consequence of Sound describe as MAGA sympathizers. He tells them Ali is a dangerous Mexican and that his baby must not be born on US soil, according to Deadline and The Guardian. He trains them with a prosthetic gun worn over the buttocks that fires when a rubber penis is pumped. TheWrap, Consequence of Sound and The Hollywood Reporter all describe it. Several outlets say real politicians turn up in the film. TheWrap names George Santos, Kari Lake and Newt Gingrich, and Deadline says Gingrich recorded warning messages about the fictional fugitive.
Late in the film Ali gets his own talk show, “The Free Speech Show”. Its centerpiece is a Holocaust-themed game. Contestants race the clock to push mannequins representing minorities into pretend shower cubicles and then press a button to seemingly release Zyklon B gas, according to The Guardian. The Arts Desk describes the showers as labeled with Zyklon B. The Jewish Chronicle and GQ describe the same game. The Guardian, GQ and The Jewish Chronicle all place Santos in the game. The Guardian says he suggested he was unaware of the true nature of the film. The audience ends with a mass Nazi salute, as The Guardian and GQ report. Deadline and Inreview both say Ali G walks away from the show afterward. The Hollywood Reporter thought the segment fizzled because making Santos look foolish felt redundant. The Globe and Mail said Cohen “somehow manages to bungle” the joke.
The finale is the film’s biggest stunt. Erran’s recruits kidnap Julie and drive her in a fake ambulance to a remote medical facility, where she gives birth to a lifelike prosthetic baby. The Guardian and Variety both describe the staged delivery. GQ says the recruits use a drone to fly what they think is a newborn baby into Mexico. The Guardian says the baby ends up dangled from a drone at a substantial height. The Guardian says one recruit decides to drop it from a height so it will not touch US soil. Empire and Film Focus Online also point to the drone. Cohen told The Hollywood Reporter that the final scene is an eight-hour continuous scene over 12 locations, with gunfire, a medical procedure and drones. World of Reel says Cohen also described an eight-hour scene on “60 Minutes”.
The ending is quieter than the climax. The film closes the way it opened, with a reminder of who was and was not “in on it”. The Globe and Mail describes a montage of the people it fooled, and Deadline says the closing graphics separate the cast from the real participants. Rihanna and A$AP Rocky turn up near the end to show that they were in on the joke, according to The Hollywood Reporter and Deadline. Consequence of Sound’s critic says they laughed “really hard” at Rihanna’s two lines. Empire put an end-credits appearance ahead of “90 per cent of what’s gone before”. Cohen says this is the last guerrilla comedy he will make, but The Hollywood Reporter notes he has said that before.
The fallout with real participants started before the weekend. The Guardian reported on October 22nd that Michael Aboud, chair of the El Paso County Republican Party, appears in the training sequence and intends to sue Cohen. Aboud says the crew told him it was a documentary about the border, and he told the paper “I plan to sue him.” The Guardian noted that the film stresses he was not in on it and that he appears in the second trailer. Time Out also says one participant is already planning to sue. Deadline points to the film’s own disclaimer, “No real person or entity depicted or appearing in the film has sponsored or otherwise endorsed its content”, and says nine lawyers worked on it.
The film arrived in the middle of an argument over Ali G himself. The BBC reports that critics have long accused the character of perpetuating racial stereotypes, and that criticism of the sequel spread online before release. Deadline spoke with Black British comedians who called him damaging, and with writer Colton Dunn, who told the outlet that “Ali G is a tool to expose racists.” Cohen wrote an essay for Time, which Variety quotes. He said the fact that Ali G is “outdated and problematic” is the very reason he brought him back. The film turns the debate into its plot, since Nira exists to cancel Ali.
Several of the harsher reviews say the character is simply out of time. Variety said Ali G risks playing as a nostalgic celebration of the thing he once skewered, and GQ found the film “deeply tired and stale”. The Playlist said the answer to the title is “a character who has outlived his welcome”. Several critics also fault the way it is made. Consequence of Sound said Cohen lacks the directing experience to blend the scripted story with the pranks, and Film Focus Online called it “very visually flat”. The Hollywood Reporter said the humor starts to drag at feature length. Variety likened it to a “Saturday Night Live” movie, and The Guardian said Julie’s jokes are tired. The Guardian also said “you’ll like this less” if you loved Ali G the first time.
The kinder reviews are not all raves. The Times, as quoted by Digital Spy, said “The plot of the film is shamelessly flimsy and not all of the gags land” before adding that the ones that do are hilarious. The Daily Beast found it “fitfully charming and witty” but never riotous. Time Out thought it “occasionally properly funny and often choke-on-your-popcorn disgusting”. Empire praised the last act as “gobsmacking viewing” and still ended with “it might be time to retire this character permanently”. The Jewish Chronicle was among the warmest, saying no one shows more chutzpah than Cohen “in full anarchic sail”. Even a mixed review such as The Hollywood Reporter’s says Cohen is “so naturally funny and quick with improvisation.”
Our lean is that the film works best in its short, strange bits and fails when it tries to carry a story. The realtor, the liquor store and the AI apology video are the scenes that critics from several outlets remember. The Voltaire quote promises something sharper than a runaway plot about a baby and a drone. Nira and Erran help Cohen make a case for satire on both sides, but critics such as The Playlist found the liberal professor a weak target. A viewer who wants Ali G in small doses will get more out of this than someone hoping for “Borat” again. The Hollywood Reporter expects the film to find a bigger audience on Prime Video, and that sounds right.
What Do You Think? Is Ali G still a fair target for satire, or has the character outlived his welcome? Did the AI apology video and the realtor scenes justify the rest of the film, and was the big finale a stunt too far? And should Cohen keep his promise that this is the last time he pranks real people?
See you on the next binge!
