Borat
The pump up for Borat was nothing short of miraculous, and the US box office take of 26 million first weekend with a limited 850 theater release proves that Mr. Cohen has wheels. He is admired for his hysterical De Ali G show, and he takes one of his main characters Borat on tour in this strange picture, which mildly disappointed.
Cohen reminds me a bit of Andy Kaufman, whose lovable Latka on the syndicated Taxi comedy was one of Kaufman’s brilliant creations that enthralled the studio to take him on, in much the same way that Robin Williams’ multiple impersonation personalities landed him on Mork and Mindy, which ignited his career. Williams has an identity on and off the stage, whereas Kaufman started messing with his audience by doing strange things on talk shows and with wrestling that many now feel like experimental bits, pushing the boundaries of comedy and performance into arenas that were perceived to be not fictional. Mr. Cohen’s whole act is about staying in character as he pulls the wool over the public’s unsuspecting eyes, a back engineered reality tv show where the interviewed are stage props and the last laugh. This makes for some remarkably fresh humor, but best in short, edited snippets, something that worked very well on Mr. Cohen’s television show. It does not work as well in the film format, where a 124 minute film feels often like an uncomfortable 4 hour passage.
The audience knows that Borat is a spoof reporter from Kazahkstan in the beginning of the film, and he sets to work belittling everyone in the movie from here on in. I thought I’d like this intro more, but it’s a bit set up. His impoverished family and home town are played by actors, as is his producer, and this is not as funny as when he gets to America on a mission subsidized by his country to discover the inner tickings of the US. The actors who are paid in this film remind us that we are watching a put on, as with his constant tangles with a producer he fights naked with in one disgusting scene, only to take the act out into the hotel lobby and into a real life banquet dinner, where they continue wrestling onstage, and are hauled off by security people in a strange gig that reads ugly in the end. There is a hired escort who also plays in the film and takes the audience out of the movie again. Mr. Cohen is big on prop pieces and uses them well, as he uses his lanky tall figure to similar effect, although there is a shelf life to all this.
Borat’s comedic power is based around the unsuspecting Americans he entraps in interviews, and in short segments they can make for fine humor. Mr. Cohen delights in the awkward moment, that time in film when all hell hangs in the balance and a delicately raised eyebrow or studdering botch of English saves him from Americans who would otherwise turn away. And Mr. Cohen seems to delight inciting Jewish hatred, ensnaring Americans into concurring when they are simply wincing to get through the moment and respect the opinions of aman from another country. The fact that Americans are so accomodating is a question that all should ask, as Universities have grown tired in their efforts to ‘teach’ relativity in society as opposed to sticking with the basics of knowledge, an issue that is growing a backlash with fangs for its stupidity in the end. This film confirms how damn flexible and agreeable Americans try to be with foreigners, which doesn’t exactly play so well. Americans like winners and the underdog, and it seems we have a natural tendency to try not to judge and bring along people who are foreign or even hostile to our culture. Borat stays at an Inn run by a very sweet Jewish couple, who come to his room with food that he won’t eat as he is staying ‘with a den of Jews’. He and his producer escape in the night, which makes me feel bad for the sweet Innkeepers. He visits a School for Manners, where he insults a dinner party although they do their best to appreciate that he is coming from another country and he simply has another cultural perspective. The suggestion is that Tarzan thought where the hostess can help Borat find his manners in a new country, but after enough crude human behavior that cannot possibly be accepted in any culture he is escorted out the door. He sings an insulting interpretation of the National Anthem at a Rodeo, where an arena full of hard working Americans try to go along with him and then boo him off the rodeo ring, and these boos spook one of the horses in the background to the point that one rodeo girl in stars and stripes falls underneath the freaked out horse. Where is there room for this to be reported in an ‘overly senstive cultural media’ that doesn’t give a damn about the middle of the country? A broken leg in middle America for a good laugh? Ha ha.
Borat finds salvation at a Penacoastal Church, which is a little out there for me as a moderate Christian, and just imagine if you’re Jewish like Mr. Cohen, but if you think about it the same footage would look plain disrespectful in a black Baptist Church, one element of the Christian practice that even the most snooty New York intellectuals won’t disrespect. This reminds me of Al Franken finding a Jewish mole to interview at a Christian college. How do you think the Jewish community would respond if a snotty cultural Christian tried the same act on a synagogue or Jewish school? The New York Times and most other media outlets would have that guy’s head on a stake the way they tried to ruin Mr. Gibson during the production of his Passion movie. This was one of the most appalling media attacks I’ve ever seen, and much more frightening than Mr. Gibson’s drunken remarks three years after the media tried to viciously blackball him out of Hollywood. I’m seeing his next movie too just like all the other people who were fuming that here is a Christian getting kneecapped by a biased press and the Anti-Defamation League for making a Jesus movie. Meanwhile, Mr. Cohen can whale on the cross and the media finds it hysterical. This glaring hypocrisy has been institutionalized in America’s cultural architecture and is terribly annoying. You know that old saying, if you can’t take it don’t dish it out. The inequity here is my point; it’s obvious, relevant and timely. Borat’s tango with Jesus is not insulting at all actually, rather innocent and mildly amusing. But his continued arm twisting of naive Americans to goad them on camera into agreeing with his Jewish bashing reminds Christians they have been conditioned to fear the mudslinging term anti-semite, when in fact the term has been so abused it has lost its meaning in contemporary America (although the term was always one of confusion). People don’t even hear the words anymore, don’t look up from their soup. Mr. Cohen’s Borat talks in and around this issue throughout the entire film for any cheap laugh he can get and it grows shopworn after the initial shock wears off, a Jewish comic playing a middle eastern hater of Jews.
I thought 1:24 minutes would be a breeze, but it felt like a marathon. I started looking for the exit signs halfway through the film. Mr. Cohen is a special talent but his work belongs in shorter segments. He can struggle with this while rolling around in his massive pile of dough.
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