I Love Boosters opens in cinemas in the United Kingdom on Friday 30 October 2026, after its earlier release in the United States. I Love Boosters is written and directed by Boots Riley, whose previous feature was Sorry to Bother You. It follows a group of shoplifters called the Velvet Gang, led by Corvette, played by Keke Palmer, with Sade, played by Naomi Ackie, and Mariah, played by Taylour Paige. The group steals clothes from Metro Designer stores and sells them on at lower prices, in a story that takes aim at the fashion industry and at the gap between the price of clothes in shops and the wages of the people who make them.
I Love Boosters and the Velvet Gang
The Velvet Gang targets stores stocked by fashion designer Christie Smith, played by Demi Moore. Radio Times reported that Corvette has a personal reason for targeting Smith’s label, and that the group redistributes the clothes to the local community for far less than the prices on the sales racks. MissFlicks described I Love Boosters as a caper in which the group runs a criminal enterprise built on boosting clothes and selling them at discounted prices. The cast also includes LaKeith Stanfield, Eiza Gonzalez, Poppy Liu, Will Poulter, Don Cheadle and Viggo Mortensen, according to Geeky Brummie and the film’s listings. Riley based I Love Boosters on a song he wrote 20 years ago, WiseVoter reported, and the song gave the project its title and its starting point.
The story moves beyond the shops in Oakland. Radio Times reported that I Love Boosters travels from the malls of Oakland to the factories in China where Metro Designer clothes are made by labourers working in exploitative conditions. That shift is part of Riley’s plan for the film, which he described to Radio Times as a comedy that works as a direct conversation about class. He told the outlet that comedy runs through life, and that a story told only as a dry drama would have to subtract comedy from the way things are.
I Love Boosters and the cast at its center
Palmer plays Corvette, the leader of the group, and Ackie plays Sade, who adopted an Oakland accent for the role, according to WiseVoter. Moore plays Christie Smith, a billionaire couture designer whose clothes are the target of the gang’s thefts. One review, published by BrillFilms, described Moore’s part as a returning cameo rather than a constant presence, but called it a potent one, and said Smith was the object of obsessive attention from the young women who shoplift her clothes and sell them on at knockdown prices. The same review noted that Mariah has an unusual ability in I Love Boosters: by holding her breath, she turns herself into a white woman who is less likely to be challenged in a store, a device the review linked to questions about race and how people are seen in shops.
Riley told Radio Times that he tries to feel a film out in his body rather than following a script line by line, and that he has worked as an artist for decades and wants to use that instinct. He said much of film has been reduced to numbers, with decisions made about what makes people go to a film and what makes them stay away, and that he wanted to work against that way of thinking. I Love Boosters premiered at the South by Southwest Film and TV Festival on 12 March 2026, according to Wikipedia, and it was released theatrically in the United States by Neon on 22 May 2026, where it received positive reviews from critics.
I Love Boosters and the reviews so far
Early reviews in the United Kingdom have called the film chaotic, creative and funny, while also noting that it loses its way in the final act. MissFlicks said Palmer shines in the lead role and called the film bonkers and absurd, in the same spirit as Sorry to Bother You, but said it totally loses the plot in the final act. BrillFilms called it an entertaining fantasy caper about the fashion business, and described it as a madcap, mile-a-minute story. Geeky Brummie reported that the film’s Rotten Tomatoes rating, quoted at 100 percent in the trailer, had fallen to a still strong 92 percent, with critics calling it creative, chaotic and very funny. The film runs 113 minutes, according to the Watershed cinema listing, and it carries a 15 certificate in the United Kingdom, according to the weekly cinema guide.
The UK release on 30 October puts I Love Boosters in cinemas alongside other new releases that week, including Everest: The Other Side, Wicker and Primetime, according to Future of the Force.