Face it, Borat sucks
I haven’t seen the movie, but given that you can’t open a newspaper or magazine or turn on a television set or radio or computer without seeing stupid Sacha Baron Goddamn Cohen doing his goddamn Borat act, I have seen enough of Borat to not want to see another second of him, and to suspect that the film is like one of those Saturday Night Live acts that stops being funny after the first 10 seconds, but ends up getting made into a movie and that you have to hear every stupid jackass in the country doing an impersonation of for the next year.
Isn’t Borat just a lukewarm microwaved leftover of Andy Kaufman’s “Foreign Guy” schtick, which got old after about half a season of Taxi? Ha ha: those zany foreigners talk funny. Even the confrontational “media hacking” aspect of Borat, and the fact that Cohen’s doing all his media appearances in character are both ripped straight out of the Kaufman playbook.
Actually, that Dig article nails what I think is worst about Borat:
With each declaration that we’re entering “sexy good time,” the sharp satire in the movie gets duller and duller. Soon the racism in the movie isn’t funny because it exposes people’s prejudice, it’s funny because “throwing the Jews down the well” is catchy song and a Jew disposal method that maybe we should start considering more seriously.
It’s another example of the inherent limitations of satire: at the same time you are poking holes in something, you are also validating its existence. As Peter Cook said about his Establishment Club in the 60’s, it’s modeled on “those wonderful Berlin cabarets which did so much to stop the rise of Hitler and prevent the outbreak of the Second World War”. And when asked to explain why he stopped doing satire, satirist par exellence Tom Lehrer said, “The audiences like to think that satire is doing something. But, in fact, it is mostly to leave themselves satisfied. Satisfied rather than angry, which is what they should be.”
November 15th, 2006 at 11:53 am
I agree, Ezra–I even found Borat’s mug leering from Wired Magazine.
November 15th, 2006 at 2:47 pm
I totally agree on all points, and the Lehrer quote is right on. There’s something evil about making racism a joke. Mind you, I haven’t seen the movie, either, but like you, I don’t want to.
November 15th, 2006 at 3:13 pm
This was a risky film for Fox and sending Cohen out to promote the film, in character no less, was a good idea at first. However, the constant barrage of hype, and Cohen’s refusal to drop the act, has steadily worn away whatever curiousity I initially had.
I’m glad you mentioned Kaufman because he’s an obvious point of reference and I’m surprised more people haven’t pointed it out. I think the main difference is that Cohen’s act is so clearly politically motivated. In that sense I think he’s closer to the Michael Moore/Daily Show “give ‘em enough rope and they’ll hang themselves” style of interviewing.
It can be funny at first (and I really like the Daily Show and even enjoyed Cohen’s Ali G Show in very small doses) but I always feel a little sorry for most of the poor bastards who agree to the interview. It’s such an unfair, lose/lose situation. With enough leading questions and clever editing they can use your own words to make you look like an idiot. If you choose not to participate than you look like you look like an unhip, humorless grouch who probably has something to hide.
November 15th, 2006 at 3:49 pm
I don’t think it’s so risky. Fox has been taking stuff like that to the bank for years. Stuff that is supposedly subversive, which in reality offends no-one, but comes close enough to the line to get free publicity.
But I think you and I are in almost complete agreement on this one.
Why are you surprised I thought of Andy? I have always felt a spiritual connection to him, even before that play we were involved in which I will not mention again. Didn’t you know that? Maybe it’s because I saw him in utero.
November 15th, 2006 at 3:50 pm
Q: Terri, how many racists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
A: That’s not funny!
November 15th, 2006 at 4:50 pm
I’m not surprised that YOU mentioned him. I just thought, given the amount of press Borat has receieved, some critic or pundit would have invoked Kaufman’s name by now but I haven’t heard it mentioned once.
He’ll have to retire Borat pretty soon now that everyone is in on the joke, but expect to see Cohen around for a few more years yet. Just yesterday it was confirmed that he will be in Tim Burton’s adaptation of Sweeney Todd.
November 15th, 2006 at 8:46 pm
Well, I saw the movie and thought it was pretty funny. It has certainly been overhyped, however. Yes, it’s a social satire, but in spite of what you hear, I think that’s less of the focus…at least for me. I found it funny for the same reason that something like “Candid Camera” is funny…watching what ordinary people do and say when they suddenly find themselves faced with the unexpected and ridiculous.
November 16th, 2006 at 7:39 am
Will you still want to be my friend if I say that I liked the movie, despite the flimsy plot and blatant gross-out bits? I could stand for a moratorium on imitating the character’s accent, however.
November 16th, 2006 at 12:35 pm
Trixie, I don’t have a comprehensive list of friendship-imperiling beliefs, but I’m pretty sure you’ll have to try harder to get rid of me than liking a movie. Unless it’s like a Leni Riefenstahl movie or something.
November 18th, 2006 at 7:36 am
If you look back, you’ll see this pattern occurring over and over again. Borat is appealing simultaneously at the guilt of America and the vidictiveness of - well - his tarantula folk. He’s sofftening up America while he makes the shameless even more shameless.