Comedian Sacha Baron Cohen is making his directorial debut with "Ali G: Who Iz I?," an Amazon MGM mockumentary sequel due out October 23. The trailer dropped in late August, showing Cohen back in fake dreadlocks and a Rastafarian hat. A UK media-monitoring group called NewsCord launched a campaign asking cinemas worldwide to refuse to screen the film. The campaign has driven 44,814 emails to chains like Odeon, Cineworld and Vue. Separately, Vidiots, a nonprofit revival cinema in Los Angeles, had scheduled a Borat repertory screening for August 29. It then quietly deleted the listing from its website and never announced a cancellation.

1. The Boycott Campaign (NewsCord)

NewsCord argues Ali G is a racist caricature dressed up as satire, and it shouldn't be screened.

NewsCord says Cohen has always used satire as cover. The group describes the character as "cover for enforcing racist stereotypes." It points to the fake dreadlocks, the Rasta hat and the exaggerated patois as caricatures of Jamaican and Black British culture.

Black British comedians made the same case back in 2000. They called Ali G "an alibi for racism" when Cohen first built his career on the character. NewsCord's campaign leans directly on that history.

NewsCord's campaign has real numbers behind it. Its email count climbed from 36,000 to 44,814 in under a week. Separately, similar complaints calling Borat "racist" circulated around the Vidiots screening before it disappeared from the schedule.

2. The Cinema Industry (UK Cinema Association)

The UK Cinema Association says booking a film isn't censorship. But pulling one under pressure isn't neutral either.

Cinemas aren't the judge here. Phil Clapp, chief executive of the UK Cinema Association, told Variety cinemas are "not there to act as censors or arbiters of public taste." Once the British Board of Film Classification certifies a film, he said, exhibitors decide whether to book it based on what their own audience wants.

No chain has actually confirmed a refusal. NewsCord previously claimed Picturehouse Cinemas had agreed not to show the film. Picturehouse actually gave a standard line — the film "had not yet been booked." As of September 1, no cinema chain has announced it's turning the film away.

3. Cohen's Defenders

Cohen's defenders say this is an organized effort to get his work pulled, not a genuine anti-racism campaign.

Cohen isn't backing down. He posted on X: "In an age where a comedian's career can be ended by a single un-PC joke, I thought I'd play it safe and bring this guy back."

Breitbart columnist John Nolte calls the Vidiots cancellation ironic. He points out that Cohen has previously pushed platforms to police hate speech and misinformation online. Nolte argues Cohen is now facing that same kind of pressure campaign against his own work.

Not everyone reacting to the trailer is upset. NBA star Kevin Durant and rapper A$AP Rocky both publicly said they're looking forward to the movie, pushing back on the idea that the backlash is universal. Cohen's defenders also note that NewsCord usually focuses on Israel-Palestine media coverage, not film criticism. They say that raises questions about why the group picked this fight.

Where This Lands

NewsCord says Ali G revives a racist caricature and wants cinemas to refuse it. The UK Cinema Association says that call isn't the industry's to make once a film is certified, and so far no chain has actually turned the movie away. Cohen and his defenders say the whole campaign is a pressure tactic dressed up as anti-racism. Vidiots' quiet cancellation of an unrelated Borat screening in Los Angeles suggests that pressure is already working on somebody.

Sources