BORAT
dir: Larry Charles
"May George Bush drink the blood of every man, woman, and child in Iraq!" - Borat
Brief Synopsis
A Kazakhstani journalist named Borat embarks on a trip to the United States, regarded as the greatest place in the world, to report on the culture and find his true love, Pamela Anderson.
Why It's Here
"Borat" is a comedy so obnoxious that it is easy to write off as idiotic and meaningless humour. However, "Borat" is exactly the opposite. Sacha Baron Cohen, the king of character acts, creates his role to undermine the society of America, pretending to be a reporter from Kazakhstan with his documentary crew, many of the faces he runs into are everyday people, unscripted. While others are scripted, it is difficult to differentiate which is which sometimes, but in the end, the verdict is the same: America is pretty ignorant.
Cohen was attacked by Kazakhstani officials for his misportrayal of their country (which he showed as dilapidated and poor) and with their customs. But, that is the point, "Borat" is nothing like Kazakhstan, yet Americans bought it, hook, line, and sinker. Borat even manages to get on national television on a morning show he is so convincing. Painting an uneven picture of how well recognized American customs are in the world, while anyone outside of America is strange and foreign. Borat's "customs" include hating/killing Jews, treating mentally challenged people like animals, and being unfamiliar with toilets so he either goes outside or in a bag. And each time he expresses his typical behaviour, the ignorance of the people he meets leads them to either ignore his statement or attempt to sell him a product, such is the case with a gun store owner who tells him which gun is best to kill Jews with.
Borat is both a harsh social critique of America, whose citizens cheer him on as he sarcastically promotes America's invasion of Iraq, and it is a laugh out loud comedy which can be taken at face value as a series of penis jokes and Pamela Anderson chases, or taken as a comedy of how shockingly blind the American public is. "Borat" covers lots of ground, leaving no one spared in his pranks. The funniest, and possibly saddest part of the whole endeavor is that as MetroMix.com mentions, it had to take a hurtful stereotype like Borat just to realize the stereotype that America sees in the rest of the world. Even more funny and sad, is the fact that once Cohen took a bite out of the American public, he spit it back out and fed it to them in millions of theatres, giving Cohen an Oscar nomination, celebrity status, and a few bucks to sit on as well.
Cohen was attacked by Kazakhstani officials for his misportrayal of their country (which he showed as dilapidated and poor) and with their customs. But, that is the point, "Borat" is nothing like Kazakhstan, yet Americans bought it, hook, line, and sinker. Borat even manages to get on national television on a morning show he is so convincing. Painting an uneven picture of how well recognized American customs are in the world, while anyone outside of America is strange and foreign. Borat's "customs" include hating/killing Jews, treating mentally challenged people like animals, and being unfamiliar with toilets so he either goes outside or in a bag. And each time he expresses his typical behaviour, the ignorance of the people he meets leads them to either ignore his statement or attempt to sell him a product, such is the case with a gun store owner who tells him which gun is best to kill Jews with.
Borat is both a harsh social critique of America, whose citizens cheer him on as he sarcastically promotes America's invasion of Iraq, and it is a laugh out loud comedy which can be taken at face value as a series of penis jokes and Pamela Anderson chases, or taken as a comedy of how shockingly blind the American public is. "Borat" covers lots of ground, leaving no one spared in his pranks. The funniest, and possibly saddest part of the whole endeavor is that as MetroMix.com mentions, it had to take a hurtful stereotype like Borat just to realize the stereotype that America sees in the rest of the world. Even more funny and sad, is the fact that once Cohen took a bite out of the American public, he spit it back out and fed it to them in millions of theatres, giving Cohen an Oscar nomination, celebrity status, and a few bucks to sit on as well.