BORAT [2006] review

BORAT is the kind of movie that should be seen on its opening weekend. Seeing it some 5 months since its release date, I have already heard of most of the scenes from the movie and/or seen clips of them, so it wasn’t totally fresh for me. The delay in seeing it is due to Japan’s overloaded movie schedule for the few screens (relatively) they have in Tokyo to show movies on.

There were many very funny scenes where the laughs come one after another, but taken as a whole, I somewhat felt the movie to be short and not very substantive. I have watched Sacha Baron Cohen’s TV show Ali G before which is a series of skits involving the title character, Borat and another who I hear will have his own movie soon, Bruno. BORAT seemed to be an extended series of sketches rather than a feature length film and the whole time I was trying to guess if it was a staged scene or real. Many of the scenes were in fact real, which added to my appreciation of the boldness of the comedy. Yet some scenes were far too real, in particular the nude wrestling match which was just unbelievably vulgar and kind of tainted the movie overall I think. A very unnecessary scene.

And I wonder just how much racism BORAT shows to be underlying in America…..how many people interviewed by Borat did not respond in a way suggesting anti-semitism or homophobia? Were the scenes in the movie really representative of the majority, or hand picked for their overt showings of racism?

My favorite scene was a simple one involving a “gypsy.” The scariest was one involving a Pentecostal church showing that a U.S. Congressman and a state supreme court judge do not believe in evolution. Borat showed us many things, from what drunk frat guys really thinks about women, to what an old cowboy would really like to do to all gay people, to that even southern hospitality has its limits.

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