A campaign is asking cinemas around the world to reject Sacha Baron Cohen’s new Ali G movie, but its first claimed exhibitor win arrived before the theater chain in question had actually made a decision about showing the film.
NewsCord began contacting exhibitors after Amazon MGM released the trailer for Ali G: Who Iz I?. The group accuses Cohen of reviving a character built around racist stereotypes and said its campaign had generated more than 36,000 emails by Aug. 29.
NewsCord removed Picturehouse from its target list after the U.K. chain responded that it did not “currently” plan to show the film on its Oct. 23 release date. The campaign treated that answer as the outcome it had requested, and the response was subsequently reported as evidence that Picturehouse would not screen the movie.
That is not Picturehouse’s confirmed position. Variety reported that the message was a standard customer-service response for a film that had not yet been booked or added to the chain’s schedule. Picturehouse had not made a decision about whether it would ultimately screen Ali G: Who Iz I?.
Picturehouse Has Not Joined the Ali G Boycott
Picturehouse’s response said, “We currently do not have any plans to screen this film on its release.” The wording initially appeared definitive enough that the reply was reported as a refusal, including amid coverage by The Independent and other U.K. outlets.
Variety subsequently reported that there was no boycott decision behind the message. The response is the type Picturehouse sends when customers ask about films that have not yet been booked and do not appear on its schedule, and the chain had not decided whether to carry Ali G: Who Iz I?.
NewsCord nevertheless removed Picturehouse from its mailing list, saying the chain had provided “the outcome every letter asks” for. Its campaign page now tells participants that Picturehouse “is not planning to screen the film,” even though Variety’s reporting establishes that the chain’s eventual booking decision remains open.
Phil Clapp, chief executive of the U.K. Cinema Association, also pushed back against the broader premise that exhibitors should decide what audiences are permitted to see. He told Variety that cinemas are not there to serve as “censors or arbiters of public taste” and said that once a film receives a British Board of Film Classification certificate, exhibitors should base booking decisions on the likely response from their audiences.
The campaign remains active against major theater operators across the U.K., United States, Canada, Australia, continental Europe, Mexico and the Middle East.
Criticism of Ali G Dates Back More Than 25 Years
Cohen introduced Ali G on Channel 4’s The 11 O’Clock Show in 1998. The character is a dim-witted white man from Staines who adopts language, clothing and mannerisms associated with Black British, Jamaican and hip-hop culture while interviewing politicians, academics and celebrities who often do not realize they are participating in a comedy setup.
Criticism of that premise emerged long before the current movie. A Guardian report from January 2000 documented objections from Black British comedians who argued that Ali G allowed predominantly white audiences to laugh at Black street culture while maintaining a sense that they were participating in politically acceptable satire.
Comedian Felix Dexter said the character allowed liberal middle-class viewers to mock Black street culture in a context where they could retain their sense of political correctness. Writer Jeanette Winterson separately questioned what distinguished the act from the Black and White Minstrel Show. NewsCord has made those decades-old criticisms central to its current campaign.
Cohen has described the character’s purpose differently. During a 2016 interview with Marc Maron, he said Ali G was partly an attempt to undermine establishment figures and argued that the character was so stupid that he could not plausibly exist as a real person.
Cohen Joked That Ali G Was the ‘Safe’ Character to Bring Back
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. https://t.co/8ckR5pQZQt
— Sacha Baron Cohen (@SachaBaronCohen) August 25, 2026
Cohen has not publicly addressed NewsCord or the disputed Picturehouse claim by name. He did, however, signal that he expected controversy when he released the movie’s first trailer. “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,” Cohen wrote on X.
TheWrap reported that the trailer also drew public support from figures including Kevin Durant and A$AP Rocky, while at least one Danish exhibitor targeted by the campaign responded that it intended to show the movie and argued that cinemas should remain spaces for films that can provoke or challenge audiences.
Amazon MGM has not joined the public argument. A studio representative declined to comment on the boycott campaign when contacted by TheWrap.
Ali G Returns in a Mockumentary Rather Than Another ‘Indahouse’
Ali G: Who Iz I? marks Cohen’s feature directing debut and his first movie centered on the character since Ali G Indahouse arrived in 2002. Unlike that scripted comedy, the new film adopts the mockumentary approach associated with Cohen’s Borat movies, mixing fictional material with interactions involving real people.
The official trailer begins with Ali G discovering that his longtime girlfriend Julie, played by Morgana Robinson, is eight months pregnant. Faced with becoming a father, he travels to the United States in an attempt to revive his career.
The footage previews encounters with medical professionals, members of the public and retired U.S. Army Brig. Gen. C. Stewart Rodeheaver, alongside jokes involving social media and influencer culture. Cohen filmed the project in secret, continuing the production method he previously used for Borat and Borat Subsequent Moviefilm.
Amazon MGM Studios is scheduled to release Ali G: Who Iz I? in U.S. theaters on Oct. 23, with Sony Pictures handling international distribution.