The Borat Movie

[MacGuffin]

Borat Make Funny Joke On Idiot Americans! High-Five!
Sacha Baron Cohen is either horrible or hysterical. You choose
By JOEL STEIN; Time Magazine

The giant mustache, the mesh underwear, the car dragged by mules, the wine made of fermented horse urine--sure, it seems as if comedian Sacha Baron Cohen is mocking Kazakhstan. He is not. He's mocking you. After all, you're the idiot who doesn't know where Kazakhstan is or if it's the kind of place where, as Borat claims, there's a "Running of the Jews." And more important, you're the idiot who believes so much in cultural relativism that you'll nod politely when a guy tells you that in his country they keep developmentally disabled people in cages. Or, worse yet, you're the person who tells him it's not a bad idea.

That's Baron Cohen's awesome trick: preying on the fear, fascination and, most of all, patronization of the other--the foreigner, the rapper, the gay guy. For the trick to work, we have to believe that other countries are so inferior, it's plausible that their citizens would wash their faces in the toilet. He's been exploiting this by videotaping the reaction of unsuspecting people to his characters' horrifying behavior since 1998, when he started on England's short-lived The 11 o'Clock Show, and later on HBO's Da Ali G Show. His characters--aspiring rapper Ali G, gay Austrian fashionista Brüno and Borat Sagdiyev, the U.S.-loving Kazakh--get away with astonishing rudeness because people are too weirded out by youth culture, flaming gay guys and foreigners to question them. When one of his guises gets too famous to sucker people into being interviewed, he molds himself into another one. He could be any outsider society avoids by giving a pass--a religious freak, a veteran, an old man. "Ali G played on people's ability to think that young people are so different from them they wouldn't recognize absolute stupidity and the fact that they were being made fun of," says Andrew Newman, a writer and producer on The 11 o'Clock Show. "And now Borat does the same thing but with countries they haven't heard much about."

In his new unscripted film, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, Baron Cohen takes his interactions with real people and strings them into a plot: a mockumentary about American culture gets sidetracked by a cross-country quest to meet and "make sexy time" with Pamela Anderson. Along the way, the hidden cameras capture a Southern dinner party's dismay with Borat's bathroom habits, and the guests' reaction on the arrival of his date--a black hooker. All the marks are unaware they're being fooled, which is hard to believe, especially when a gun dealer responds to the question "What kind of a gun would you recommend to kill a Jew?" with a nonchalant "I'd recommend a 9-mm or a Glock automatic." (Baron Cohen is Jewish.) The detailed legal releases, which it seems no one ever reads, were presented to people as if they were permission forms for being interviewed by a Kazakh TV show.

There hasn't been a comedy this edgy in a long time. And there certainly hasn't been one that the comedy élite is this excited by. After seeing an early screening, Curb Your Enthusiasm creator Larry David jokingly asked Borat director Larry Charles, a friend, to put his name on the movie. Even though many people have not heard of the film--Fox last week reduced the number of screens the movie would be shown on from more than 2,000 to 800 for this weekend's opening--it's being discussed on college campuses everywhere. Which is impressive, since a big part of the marketing campaign has been conducted inadvertently by the government of Kazakhstan. It first threatened legal action against Baron Cohen, then took out a somewhat unsuccessful four-page tourism ad in the New York Times ("The country is home to the world's largest population of wolves"), and finally gave up and invited the comic to visit. Baron Cohen is considering the offer as the ultimate opportunity to conflate his made-up character with reality. "I would absolutely love to go," says Borat director Charles. "Even if we got shot down on the tarmac, it would be a good way to go. That's pretty good bonus material for the DVD."

Charles and his tiny crew were just about that fearless during the making of the film. Baron Cohen was more so. For the two-month shoot, he was in character from early in the morning until night. The crew shot so much footage that Charles is trying to sell the unused parts to HBO as a series. Even when the cops came--which the director says happened at least 50 times--Baron Cohen never dropped character. It's an impressive, perhaps insane, performance: Johnny Knoxville with a sense of humor, Andy Kaufman with a desire to please, Peter Sellers set loose on the public instead of David Niven. "It's like Marlon Brando's performance in On the Waterfront," says Charles. "Before that, everything was stylized, the John Barrymore school. After that, you couldn't act in the old style anymore. I believe that Sacha's performance does the same thing."

At a time when the major TV networks can't figure out what makes people laugh, Baron Cohen, 35, is the leader of a brand of aggressive, cheaply shot street comedy that stretches from the lowbrow Jackass to the more intellectual Stephen Colbert. It's the honesty of real reactions, mixed with the personal risk, that makes kids giggle in discomfort. Picking Kazakhstan, a real country, is part of that Andy Kaufmanesque confrontation, as is Baron Cohen's insistence on doing interviews as Borat. "There's something funny about it being a genuine place," says fellow British comedian David Baddiel, who went to the same private high school and Cambridge a few years before Baron Cohen. "That's what makes Sacha's comedy modern, because if that had been an older comedian, Borat would have been from Stupidlandia or something."

By not even winking at his ruse, Baron Cohen is able to get his interviewees to show their inner selves, and it often isn't pretty. By making misogynistic, racist statements in the friendliest way and asking people to high-five over them, he gets folks to say things they wouldn't if they knew the film was going to be shown in their own country. "Political correctness has led to a more civil society because people with racist attitudes have taken them underground," says Borat producer Jay Roach, who directed Austin Powers and Meet the Parents. "It's a fascinating social experiment to observe this character walking amongst us, revealing this."

Clueless, desperate-to-fit-in, optimistic foreigners are a classic comedy trope--the Clouseaus, Cousin Balkis, Morks, Two Wild and Crazy Guys--because they spotlight the ridiculousness that we accept. When he's at a rodeo, driving the crowd into a frenzy with anti-Iraqi, pro-war cheers, Borat demonstrates how much aggression is intertwined with patriotism. And his attempts to be American pinpoint exactly how the world sees us: garish, violent, nouveau riche, a land of Donald Trumps and 50 Cents.

If Borat does well, it could change comedy in two ways. First, if high-grossing movies can be made with just a video camera and a few guys in a van, the studios might find real competition from every fool with a digital camera and access to YouTube. Second, it might limn the generational divide in the way music used to. Because any normal person over 35 is going to find Borat horrifying. What exactly is funny about being invited to nice people's homes and handing them your feces?

But Charles doesn't look at it like that. "I never felt like we tricked anyone in a cruel way. We gave people a chance to be themselves," he says. Some come out well, and others don't. The difference is that if you're over 35, you think you have the right to keep your regrettable moments private. If you're under 35, you realize that everything is public now. Even if your racist rant were for a show in Kazakhstan, it would be on the Internet anyway. Never trust anyone under 35. Especially if he has a video camera.

[pete]

hidden cameras?

[Pubrick]

Borat and Beck on Letterman tonight.

he was funny but as usual he just rehashed the material we've seen in the trailers. i think he is aware that if he uses all the best lines it'll ruin the movie.

some differences between letterman and conan appearances:

he didn't do any jew jokes on letterman, possibly because of shaffer, but he made up for it by ironically claiming shaffer was a huge star in kazakhstan.
he made one jew joke on conan, in response to conan's question about the anti-semitism in the film. which itself became an anti-semitic joke. it was alrite.

on letterman he described his sister's "vazhïn" as being "loose like sleeve of wizard" - which is hilarious.
on conan he described his wife's as hanging loose like the mouth of a tired dog - which is also brilliant.

borat's walk-on during beck's performance
was as effective as
the whole song he played on conan.

he was funnier on letterman overall. dave played the straight man and just asked questions that allowed borat to be himself.
conan was almost asking questions to cohen directly. there was too much awareness of his character, too many ppl were in on the joke.

winner: The Hunt for Red Pubis (not really but the title was too cool not to post)

[MacGuffin]

Borat book could be too hot to handle
Source: NY Daily News

Pssst. Correspondent Borat Sagdiyev has too-sexy photos of his Kazakh countrywomen to show public Americans in book. But New York publishing czars worry supermarket won't let in barenaked ladies.

Translation: Comic Sacha Baron Cohen, whose movie, "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan," opens Friday, wants to write a book based on his pants-wettingly offensive character. But publishers fear that Wal-Mart and other chains won't sell it.

The trouble is the "100 compromising Polaroids" that Cohen wants to include. We hear that Cohen has hired models to pose as Kazakh women in various states of undress. Some of the photos are said to be quite explicit - which isn't surprising considering that "Borat" told David Letterman this week that one of his "hobbies is ... to take photograph of ladies while they make toilet."

British publisher Boxtree snapped up the book for the U.K., where the book Cohen wrote as his character Ali G was a best seller.

But the Ali G book didn't do so hot in the States, partly because it also features some pictures not suitable for family shoppers.

Cohen's Trident Media agent, Daniel Strone, didn't return calls. However, Kazakhstan Embassy spokesman Roman Vassilenko did have a few things to say about Cohen's proposed salacious depiction of its female citizens.

"Kazakhstan is a moral country, and women have always played an important part in society," Vassilenko told us. "The only true thing about Kazakhstan in the movie is its geographic location."

Gauhar Abdygalieva, a Kazakh student at George Washington University concurred. "I would say this kind of portrayal is absolutely inadmissible," she said. "He comes up with really bad-looking women [who] have nothing to do with real Kazakhstan women."

But Cohen's satire may prove a boon to the former Soviet republic. Sayat Tours, "a leading Kazakh tour operator," is inviting Americans aboard its "Kazakhstan vs. Boratistan" package.

Sayat's press release beckons us to visit "high-fashion boutiques, as well as trying kumyss, the deliciously tasting Kazakh traditional drink made from fermented horse milk."

Mmmm. You'll want a Polaroid of that.

[Kal]

I dont know if the excitement to see this was too high or what, but I'm dissapointed at how the movie turned out.

It's not that the funniest parts are in the trailer, because the movie itself IS FUNNY most of the time. There are some great scenes and situations that I was dying. But I feel like most of the good Borat jokes and many of the great Borat moments from the TV show were not there (or even close). Like the Guide to Football, Guide to Dating, and some others that make me shit myself after laughing for an hour. Also, in some parts it tries to tie the story together as a story, and others it doesnt make sense. They should have done one or the other.

I hated, really hated, the iPod commercial at the end. It was cheap and it shows how Apple is everywhere. This was supposed to be different, but they fucked it up with that little thing.

Anyways, this was funny but not as funny as I expected it to be. Maybe it was me, that I was too over-excited about this and expecting too much, but it did not blow my mind. I felt like at the end of Matrix Reloaded.

[Chest Rockwell]

It's not that the funniest parts are in the trailer, because the movie itself IS FUNNY most of the time. There are some great scenes and situations that I was dying. But I feel like most of the good Borat jokes and many of the great Borat moments from the TV show were not there (or even close). Like the Guide to Football, Guide to Dating, and some others that make me shit myself after laughing for an hour.

You're saying he should have rehashed funny moments from the series?

[I Love a Magician]

I think he means that the funniest parts of the movie don't match the funniest moments from the show.

[Ravi]

I've saw some of Da Ali G Show a long time back, so I don't remember much from it.  I haven't laughed this hard at a movie in a while.  Kal's complaint about them trying to make a story out of it at parts makes sense, since those scenes don't quite feel right.  Even so, there's very little of that, and they never forget to make the film funny.  Sometimes I couldn't hear the movie, there was so much laughter.

[Kal]

Movie made 9 million dollars openning day on 837 theatres... all I can is WOW!

Over 10k average, it will give them a huge average for the weekend (over 20k), which is a big deal for ANY movie, comparable to Spider-Man and Star Wars.

[clerkguy23]

I hated, really hated, the iPod commercial at the end. It was cheap and it shows how Apple is everywhere. This was supposed to be different, but they fucked it up with that little thing.

What the hell are you talking about? Apple is everywhere... that's sort of the joke. I don't understand people getting so upset over these so-called "product placements" in a movie. Who cares?

[modage]

this is the funniest movie i can remember seeing in a long time.  we saw this at a 1pm show and it was packed.  when we came out of the theatre the people i was with said they didnt know how to feel about it. we couldnt believe what we had just seen, and i think thats the best way you can leave a movie.  not only was this the most consistently i've laughed at a movie, maybe ever, but it really seemed like it was breaking the form.  it was something i've never seen before in a film, and must be what people felt like coming out of Spinal Tap.  amazing.

[MacGuffin]

Borat Has "Very Nice!" Opening Day
Source: ShowBIZ Data

According to ShowBIZ Data, Sacha Baron Cohen's comedy Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan has grossed an estimated $8.9 million in its opening day.

That may not seem like a lot, but it's quite impressive considering 20th Century Fox's controversial decision to limit the opening to just 837 theatres, where it averaged over $10.5 thousand per site. It also surpassed the two new family comedies, Tim Allen's The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause and DreamWorks' Flushed Away, to take the top spot on Friday, even though both of those movies were playing in well over 2,000 more theatres than "Borat."

Despite Fox's reasons for the reduced opening, the highly-praised comedy which has received almost unanimous critical acclaim (96% fresh on Rotten Tomatoes!) looks likely to surpass Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 9/11 as the highest opening movie in less than 1,000 theatres. Moore's controversial doc made $8.5 million its opening day in 868 theatres to win its weekend with $23.9 million, but realistically, "Borat" may be more frontloaded to opening day due to the high anticipation.

With $5.3 and $4.8 million respectively, The Santa Clause 3: The Escape Clause and Flushed Away are likely to make up the difference over the weekend where family films do most of their business, but Cohen's comedy should still win the weekend regardless. On top of that, "Borat" is scheduled to expand into over 2,200 theatres next weekend, giving it a strong chance at 2 weeks at the top.

[Kal]

I hated, really hated, the iPod commercial at the end. It was cheap and it shows how Apple is everywhere. This was supposed to be different, but they fucked it up with that little thing.

What the hell are you talking about? Apple is everywhere... that's sort of the joke. I don't understand people getting so upset over these so-called "product placements" in a movie. Who cares?

No problem with product placement. But there is subtle ways of doing it so that its not on your face like that. I thought it was too much.

[Stefen]

Aernt you the dude who's always talking about box office receipts? Yet some badass product placement is gonna make you puke? You're a goddamn lawyer, Kal,  Prosecute some white dudes, you fucking iMac using iLife bozo. Eat a white tiger you capitalist!

ELEEEEVATION!!!!! WOO, WOO HOOOOO.

[Myxo]

..yeah

This movie was beyond funny. There isn't even a category for how hilarious Borat is. I can't remember the last time I laughed so hard during a movie that my face hurt as I left the theater. Please go see this, and see it soon. It's made 10x funnier by large crowds. I feel bad for whoever was watching 'The Departed' next door.