The trailer for I Love Boosters begins with Keke Palmer as a would-be store clerk who gives a very unique, but very honest, answer during her job interview. When asked about the challenges she would face in that position, her character admits, “I feel like I should have it all. I just want to take it all home, eat it up, and shoot it out of my eyes. It’s just feel, like, give it to me. It’s mine anyway.”
Even if Palmer’s declaration wasn’t accompanied by bold pastel images, shots of women breaking into a store, and a hip-hop infused soundtrack, the words alone would be enough to identify I Love Boosters as a Boots Riley project. The mix of Leftist politics, absurd imagery, and genuine sincerity have been the director’s calling card since his debut movie Sorry to Bother You.
In I Love Boosters, Palmer plays Corvette, leader of a shoplifting group calling themselves the Velvet Gang. Along with fellow members played by Naomi Ackie, Taylour Paige, and Poppy Liu, the Velvet Gang fights to liberate the fashion industry, advocating for what Paige’s character calls “Triple F: Fashion Forward Filanthropy.” The Velvet Gang’s revolutionary activities run afoul of fashion mogul Christie Smith, played by Demi Moore. Somehow getting even more unhinged than her character in The Substance, Moore spits lines such as, “They take my shit, and sell it to their low-class, urban bitches!”
Along the way, Smith and the Velvet Gang run into more outlandish characters played by LaKeith Stanfield, Don Cheadle, and Will Poulter, all with distinctive hairdos.
