Boots Riley is officially back on the big screen.
Neon has unveiled the first look at Riley’s highly-anticipated second feature I Love Boosters, starring Keke Palmer, Naomi Ackie, and Taylour Paige — along with a theatrical rollout date. The film will hit theaters worldwide on May 22, 2026, with Focus/Universal handling international distribution.
Shot quietly and wrapped in November 2024, I Love Boosters follows a crew of professional shoplifters — led by Corvette (Palmer) and her crew, the Velvet Gang — who survive by “boosting” luxury clothing from department stores. When a ruthless fashion CEO steals Corvette’s ideas and profits from them, the group decides to strike back, sparking a rebellious movement that spirals far beyond retail racks.
The first-look image sets the tone: Palmer, Ackie, and Paige standing in a mustard-yellow room wearing full yellow uniforms and nametags, staring off in confusion. Surreal? Yes. Bold? Absolutely. Very Boots Riley? Without question.
Joining the trio are LaKeith Stanfield, Demi Moore, Will Poulter, Poppy Liu, and Eiza González, rounding out a stacked ensemble.
A return to Riley-world
Riley burst onto the scene with 2018’s Sorry to Bother You, an audacious, anti-capitalist satire that instantly stamped him as one of the most original voices in contemporary film. Since then, he’s only extended that vision — most recently with his 2023 Prime Video series I’m a Virgo, blending political commentary and absurdist storytelling with unapologetically Black imagination.
With I Love Boosters, Riley continues exploring class, labor, and resistance — themes rooted in his background as the frontman of The Coup and his upbringing around Black liberation movements. As Riley joked when teasing the film, it sits “somewhere between the Boots Riley genre and some other shit that I don’t know.”
Fans wondered whether he’d debut the film at Sundance — the same festival where Sorry to Bother You exploded in 2018 — but the May release positions I Love Boosters squarely near Cannes. A Croisette appearance, potentially in Un Certain Regard, feels fitting for a filmmaker whose voice thrives on cinematic disruption.