Ali G: Who Iz I?

Dir. Sacha Baron Cohen · 2026 · about 1 h 29 · certificate 15 (UK) · in cinemas from 23 October

The setup

Ali G is in his fifties and the money has run out. His long-term girlfriend Julie (Morgana Robinson) is eight months pregnant, he has no job and little interest in the responsibilities coming his way. Then an old fax arrives with an offer from HBO for a third season of his show, and he heads for Los Angeles to close a deal that turns out to be badly out of date. That is as far as this review goes. The film comes from Working Title and Four by Two, is released by Amazon MGM Studios, and is written by Baron Cohen with a team that includes Anthony Hines, Peter Baynham and Dan Mazer.

Two things set the ground. This is a sequel to Ali G Indahouse (2002), twenty-odd years on, and it mixes a scripted story with the staged "interviews" with real people that made the character famous. The film is also about the argument that has followed Ali G for years, over a white comedian's use of Black British and American culture as a costume. How seriously it takes that argument is the thing critics disagree about most.

What works

The fans among the reviewers are specific about why. Chortle's Steve Bennett, who gives it four stars, calls the stunts "genuinely jaw-dropping" in what they get people to believe, finds it surprisingly timely in the current culture-war climate, and singles out Morgana Robinson as a standout. Time Out's Phil de Semlyen gives it three stars and says the film is "occasionally properly funny and often choke-on-your-popcorn disgusting". He thinks the character's ageing helps: Ali's delusions are even sillier in middle age. The Times, in a score of 80 on Metacritic, says that when the gags land they are hilarious.

"Broad and crass as it often is – in fact always is – this Ali G sequel is sometimes funny."

Peter Bradshaw, The Guardian (as quoted on Metacritic)

What doesn't

The doubters are just as specific. TheWrap's Todd Gilchrist calls it a "dispiriting and painfully humorless affair" and writes that the shock value of the gags no longer lingers. Variety's Owen Gleiberman, per Metacritic's summary, finds only a few scattered giggles and a film that is dawdling and cumbersome. Consequence's Liz Shannon Miller says it tries to be both a real story and a prank show, and succeeds at neither. Even the warmer reviews say the sketches clash with the larger plot, and Bennett warns that the smutty sex jokes can be off-putting.

In Review Online's Tyler Thier thinks there is a better film inside it: a focused version about Ali's ego in a changed cultural climate might have worked, but too many threads, a lot of other characters and some AI-generated material dilute it. De Semlyen's complaint is the sharpest of the lot, that it is scattergun and repeats a point Borat already made well.

Where the critics land

Metacritic shows 38 out of 100 from 13 reviews, which it labels "generally unfavorable", but the spread is wide: the Times at 80 and Chortle at four stars on one side, the Globe and Mail at 5 on the other. We give it two and a half. Reviewers who enjoyed it point to the best of the stunts and to Robinson, but most agree the material is stretched thin across a feature.

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Where to watch

Ali G: Who Iz I? opened in cinemas on 23 October, and Amazon MGM Studios is the distributor. It carries a 15 certificate in the UK for strong sex references, crude humour, language and discrimination. We have not confirmed a streaming date, and availability varies by country, so check your local cinema listings.

Sources

This is a critical reading drawn from published reviews and film databases, not a first-hand viewing. We drew on:

• Time Out (Phil de Semlyen)
• Chortle (Steve Bennett)
• TheWrap (Todd Gilchrist)
• In Review Online (Tyler Thier)
• Metacritic (score, runtime and excerpts from The Times, The Guardian, Variety, Consequence, Radio Times and others)
• Flicks (certificate and synopsis)
• Wikipedia (credits and release)