"nearly all Borat's victims are Republicans"

[rusty charly]

"For the amazing thing about his new film is how brutally it ridicules the United States. Borat's victims are all hapless Americans, mugged by Oxbridge irony. The rodeo crowd who howl down his rendition of a spoof Kazakh national anthem, sung to the tune of "The Star Spangled Banner"; the Southern architect and preacher who invite him to dinner only to have him vilify their wives; the Pentecostal worshippers whom he mocks by pretending to shake and speak in tongues; the politically incorrect frat boys who give him a lift in their van and, in their cups, expose their own sad misogyny — all of them trustingly welcomed a man whom they took to be a genuine Central Asian journalist, and all of them ended up abjectly humiliated. And yet American audiences roar with laughter. The film is a hit, topping the box office again this weekend and generating close to $68 million so far.

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-ferguson13nov13,0,5958394.column?coll=la-util-opinion-commentary

The explanation is, of course, that nearly all Borat's victims are Republicans. God-fearing, often Southern and just a little unused to tricky foreigners, such people were supposed to be the Republican Party's core support. Suddenly the rest of the nation is laughing at them — and outvoting them. It's as if blue America is in on the joke being played on red America by Sacha. And that's why the popularity of his movie — which I saw with my family in San Francisco on the eve of the election — was a harbinger of the drubbing red-state America was going to suffer at the polls."

*****************

see repukes get their pants in a bunch:

http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives/2006/11/borat_the_jokes.html

http://www.fraterslibertas.com/2006_11_01_archive.html#116334417644738012

[trotsky]

1. One of the funniest films in ages.

I don't remember laughing so hard in a movie theater. My sides were literally aching by the end.

Sacha Baron Cohen is a comedic and social genius, and if he makes a billion dollars on this film he will have earned every goddamned penny.

[CoffeeCat]

2. Those frat boys were something else...

...I tell you what. I was almost sick to my stomach after those scenes. That parting shot
from the sickening frat boy, "Never EVER let a woman change who you are!!!" was a lovely thought.
Why don't we all cross stitch that one on a pillow.

Also, the Pentecostal religious nutjobs...so lovely to see a FEDERAL JUDGE and a United States Congressman
preaching at the podium!!! Sheesh!! It's difficult to imagine that people like this even exist. To
understand how deluded and freaky they are--and to know that they were part of Junior's "base" is enough
to make my hair stand on end. Unbelievable.

Borat showed me that America is a scary place!

Hold me!

[aquart]

11. What happened in the frat boy scenes?

[CoffeeCat]

14. The frat boy scene...

...was about 15 minutes of racist, woman-hating, disrespectful, sexist bantering from three
drunken jerks inside a roving RV. They talked about how minorities really have all of the
power in the United States and that slavery should be brought back.

One guy talked about how he had sex with women and would never call them back.
Borat said, "Why don't you call them back...because they don't have a phone?" and the
frat boy said, "I don't call them back because I have no respect for them!!! HAHAHAHAHA!!".

Two of the three frat boys are suing the makers of Borat. They claim that they
were told that the footage would not be shown in the United States. Idiots!

[shanti]

25. yeah

they're sueing because their freaking pride was hurt. boohoo! their words and actions are on film - too bad, so sad! imo, it's like calling out a racist to their face.

[aquart]

29. So they were eager to look like bigots for a foreign audience?

Well, hopefully they won't be dating much.

[unblock]

3. i took it as more anti-south than anti-republican

it's no coincidence that borat's trip out west from new york took a southern route.

and yes, a hilarious movie! omigod, the fight scene! :puke:

:rofl:

[CoffeeCat]

15. The fight scene!

I'm still having flashbacks!!

:rofl: and :puke:

[aquart]

30. What fight? Who fought?

Was anyone hurt?

[trotsky]

32. Borat and his "producer" got into a heated argument

and ended up wrestling. In the nude. I am still cracking up as I write this, it was so hilarious.

[Buzz Clik]

4. More whining. Now Borat's picking on the knuckledraggers.

:cry:

[aquart]

5. You mean those people weren't actors?

Oh, my word.

[ret5hd]

7. hell no...that's the BEAUTY of the film!

[AZBlue]

18. No, they were real people who were duped, some going along to be polite

And now they've lost their jobs and their friends and are being threatened.

Yeah, good movie. :sarcasm:

[CoffeeCat]

20. Hey, it was hilarious...

The only two (as far as I know) who have lost jobs--are the racist, bigoted, sexist, woman-hating
frat boys.

Those guys are ignorance and evil personified. No one should feel sorry for them.

Who would want those venomous clowns working for them?

[bobbie]

26. I haven't seen it but it seems very mean spirited.

Doubt I will see it.

[aquart]

28. Why did they lose their jobs?

Wait. Were the cameras hidden?

[CoffeeCat]

35. No hidden cameras...

...the people in the film thought they were being interviewed by a foreign journalist
from Kazakhstan. So no hidden cameras. All of these people said these things, knowing
that a camera was filming them.

I'll give you one example. There was a woman in the film who was a manners coach. She was
really sweet and professional. She was told that a man from Kazakhstan was touring across
America, and he wanted to talk to someone about manners and etiquette in the US. She agreed to
do the interview. So....in the movie "Borat" we see this woman giving advice to Borat. He
asks her if it is ok to talk about his family, with dinner guests. She says sure. He then
asks her if it is ok to show pictures of family members. She says that would be nice. Then
Borat pulls out pictures of his son. Some of them were close-up pictures of him nude and
Borat says, "Would these be appropriate to show?". So, the woman has no idea that Borat is
an actor. She thinks she's talking with a naive man from Kazakhstan. Therein lies the
humor as these people try to explain things like, "Well no...you probably shouldn't circulate
nude photos of your son's penis at a dinner party."

Borat also pretends to be racist, sexist and anti-semitic--and it's laughable, outrageous (and sad)
how some people openly agree with him and chime in to share their own bigotry. Like the frat boys
who droned on and on about how minorities have all the power in this country--and that the US should
go back to the days of slavery.

You end up watching really nice people trying to negotiate Borat's weirdness--and also you watch
raging bigots become victims of themselves.

So many great moments in this movie!

[hoboken123]

39. With all that...

...we should probably string him up on general principle.


We need to protect people from their own words and actions.

[CoffeeCat]

19. No....they weren't actors...

I heard that people were told that Borat was from Kazakhstan, and that he
was filming a documentary. That was the beauty of the film. People knew
they were being filmed, so they tried to be polite and impress people because
they knew they were on camera.

Many assumed that Borat was an ignorant doofus foreigner--but the real joke
was on them.

I loved the scene when he was on the NY City subway. He opened his briefcase
to reveal a live chicken. People were freaking out. He went around the subway
introducing himself and trying to kiss the men. I thought he would be killed.
One NYorker said, "If you try to kiss me, I'll kick your f***ing b**** in!!".

And that was language from the nicest New Yorker on the subway.

I thought for sure Borat would die that day!

[aquart]

31. That's my town!

[CoffeeCat]

34. You gotta see this movie then...

aquart! Borat spends a lot of time in NY.

You'll find it hilarious.

Can you imagine what happens when a tall foreigner attempts to scream "Hi!" to NYorkers
and runs after them yelling, "I just want to say hello!!".

Go see it and report back here! :)

You'll love it.

[tblue]

6. Yeah, Bob Barr and Alan Keyes LOL! I noticed that, too. The people in that megachurch and at the

rodeo gave me the creeps. I walked out of the theatre saying, 'Republicans are some scary folks.' But that was one of the funniest movies I have ever seen. That dinner with those tightassed people was hilarious! Also, when he was checking into the hotel with his pants pulled down. I laughed most of the way through. Did not like the fight with his buddy, tho. Eeew!

[Pirate Smile]

13. OMG - That scene was unwatchable. I went with a friend and we both had our faces

covered with our hands. Every so often I would peak out and EKKKKK! It was still going on and now they were in the 69 position. Ekkkkk!




LOL

[CoffeeCat]

16. Bob Barr was priceless!!

I loved the look on Bob Barr's face when Borat asked him to have some cheese, and
then proceeded to tell him that his wife made the cheese--with her own breast milk!!!

Barr looked like he was going to hurl!!!

:rofl:

[nadinbrzezinski]

8. I enjoyed the jokes

dccept for ONE scene that it could do without... overall, FUNNY

[Mojambo]

9. Yeah, I didn't think the antique store bit worked well either. n/t

[Doctor_J]

10. I don't see the name of the movie, here or in the review

Am I missing something?

[Mojambo]

12. Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan.

http://movies.yahoo.com/shop?d=hv&id=1809426565&cf=info

[AZBlue]

17. Sterotypical Republicans you mean?

Or did he find out his victims' political affiliations before he went after them?

[mrreowwr_kittty]

21. Well probably with Barr and Keyes he did

With the rest there was no need.

[CoffeeCat]

22. He made fun of some lefties, too...

He interviewed those feminists and made total sport of them.

[Fonde Ombre]

23. I used to love Sacha Baron Cohen. Now...I feel betrayed

The crowd I saw the movie with was really eating up the *Borat* movie's Jackass-qualities.
Good thing for Cohen's bank account that he didn't inject any true irony or subtlety into his Big Screen Affair.
Does anyone wanna come to terms with the fact that the "character" has no real distance from the Frat Boys who where unapologetically anti-feminist.
There were lots of things to be disgusted by in this movie. The attack on the three feminists was totally lame and pointless. The antique shop falling-on-plates gag was frightfully unfunny.
Worst of all, however, was the lack of genuine satire, that his TV skits at least flirted satisfyingly with.

[AtomicKitten]

24. critics would tend to disagree with your assessment

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/11/03/DDGRCM45V31.DTL&type=movies

[Fonde Ombre]

27. Mick LaSalle is not, in my estimation, a critic

There are NO critics in any of the San Francisco papers, sad to say.
A dispiriting reality I knew all too well when I lived in the Bay Area .
Mick is just another Ultra Politically Correct lemming who thinks he's being rebellious by approving of *Borat*...
The thing is, Sacha had everything going already to make me love this movie.
The premise, and all I read about the scenes, sounded excellent.
The big disappointment was, it couldn't be carried over to feature-length, untainted by the corrupting, dulling influence of Hollywood/MTV/"Reality"-Tv rubbish.
I still have the video of Da Ali G Show, to remind me Sacha is capable of sharp satire.
Everything in the movie, either felt third rate, or fell flat altogether.
Essentially calling that Preacher's wife an ugly pig, at the Dinning-Etiquette soiree, was the worst crime-against-satire.
For that, and many other slip-up's , the film is a negligible waste.
Waste -- yes, with a few sparkling exceptions.

[trotsky]

33. Ummm...

Does anyone wanna come to terms with the fact that the "character" has no real distance from the Frat Boys who where unapologetically anti-feminist.

I've come to terms with that fact. It's kind of the POINT of the character and movie - that anti-feminism, racism, anti-Semitism, etc. all spring from IGNORANCE. Borat himself proves that - note how he was "surprised" when the feminists told him women could study and do any job a man could. He "honestly" thought that because his government researcher had "proved" women had smaller brains, that this was impossible. He perfectly illustrates that such misogynistic and racist beliefs can only be grounded in lies and ignorance.

Gosh, missing that aspect of Borat is basically missing the whole point of Baron Cohen's creation.

[Fonde Ombre]

37. This is the last thing I ever write about the *Borat* movie:

Some people thought it was funny. Okay, good for them, they were able to enjoy it on the level I described before.
For me, the Tv show of Cohen's, was far more inventive and sharp. The movie was a grotesquely stitched-together concoction of disharmonious scenes.
It wasn't my expectation, that the feature was going to be noble or award-winning. I didn't want it to be that. And no, I'm not against it because it's popular with a certain callow & crass youth culture. I fully grasp what Cohen was aiming for.

It's my opinion, however, Sacha simply fell astray from his mark, when his "character" started ruthlessly attacking too-easy targets for no particular reason. I believe the majority of the fans are accepting the character of Borat uncritically, and are thus doing Sacha Baron/Borat Cohen a disservice (unless all he's really after is the money, like Da Ali G).

He had a good thing going on the small screen. He had, conversely, a larger, more encompassing view of humanity. Now, with his ambitions to "make it" in Hollywood, I fear he's lost his way, and has begun using straw-men as his foils.

The Bob Bar & Alan Keyes segment, perfectly illustrated why I am dismayed at the new *Borat* fan's. They seem to be laughing and applauding Mr. Cohen's Concept for the scenes, rather than the results on the big screen, which are almost universally lame and a failure of imagination/ execution.
I don't say Shame On You for liking it. I am amazed, however, at how little people have come to expect from satire. Outrageousness and political incorrectness, is all well and fine, if done with a spirit of revelation.
Cohen, sadly, choose the easy way, of cruelty, and lowest-common-denominator.

[trotsky]

41. Hard to believe someone might be romanticizing about the past

when "the past" is "Da Ali G Show"!! LOL

Perhaps you're remembering a different Borat from that show than I am. I remember Borat leading some rednecks singing "Throw the Jew Down the Well." I remember him meeting with a fitness expert, and then placing his crotch about 2 inches from the man's face while having him demonstrate exercise equipment. Are these some of the examples that are so far elevated above what he does in the movie?

If anything, Baron Cohen took Borat even farther into the realm of political and social satire with the movie. Nearly all critics have said this. I guess it's too bad none of them have the keen insight (and apparently distorted view of a character's past history) that you do.

[Fonde Ombre]

42. Not much Past; plenty of Promise though...

Cohen's Tv work was uneven, but it at least had an ironic detachment from the victims of Borat's obtuseness.
My central point was NOT that things were so elevated and sophisticated before -- It's that, currently, Cohen is too content to pick on people who have no stake in the Borat characters "beliefs", one way or the other.
He is now straining to make sport out of the hypocrisies and puritanism of people who are -by&large- less guilty of hypocrisy than Cohen himself.
That comedy which breeds apathy and misanthropy about people, is not About misunderstanding, it IS misunderstanding.
Cohen's most ingenious character on the Tv show, is now a lame parody of itself.

Looking for a possible reason, to not hold Cohen on the hook completely...perhaps many of the heavy-hitters he used to make fun of, are wise to his game, and so he's pointed his cameras in the wrong direction, and lazily refused to modify his character.

[CoffeeCat]

36. I didn't see it that way...

I thought Borat and the REAL PEOPLE in the film provided an ironic (and sad) juxtaposition.

Someone in a movie who is overly sexist, anti-semitic, bigoted can be funny--because sometimes a person's ignorance
is fun to ridicule. "Borat" takes this a step further. We've got a totally bigoted foreigner who has grossly exaggerated
and absurd world views---and he meets REAL LIVE AMERICANS who agree with him and celebrate their bigotry.

Wasn't that the entire point of the movie? It was like watching every-day people lower themselves to cartoon level.

It was just funny. This wasn't "Chariots of Fire". It was just a pointed, outrageous movie.

I don't think Baron Cohen was attempting to make the next Oscar masterpiece.

[colonel odis]

38. to say the movie makes fun of middle america insults middle america.

middle american and red staters, too, are not bigoted morons. they're regular folks working their butts off trying to stay above water and get by in this crazy world.

drunken, south carolina, frat boy dickheads aren't middle america. they're frat boy dickheads. so on and so forth.

and if the movie's so awful, why's it making so damned much money?

[mw]

40. They qualified because they were STUPID, not Republicans

It just so happens that Republicans have the market cornered on STUPID.