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Underground > Film, TV & Theatre >

Borat

  
  

Page: 12(3)4

 
 
ibis the being
19:44 / 27.11.06
Back on Borat, I understand that there is a scene in which he pretends to have defecated into a plastic bag and brings it downstairs to a dinner party at the Magnolia Springs Manor. Having not seen the film itself, might I inquire as to what prejudice he is seeking to satirise there? Or is it a more general satire on the absurdity of our cultural taboos against faeces at the dinner table?

This is one of the scenes I always flash to when I think of this film as being mean-spirited and misanthropic. There is no social commentary being made here, no culture clash being humorously underlined... what culture brings feces to the dining table? Knowing absolutely nothing about Kazakhstan I feel confident saying they don't literally shit where they eat - that's a human, cross-cultural taboo he's breaking, and so what is the point? That it's funny to offend human beings? Maybe it is, to some people, but that's just "Jackass" in different packaging, as I said earlier.

wc: I don't read Rolling Stone, is the article online?
 
 
miss wonderstarr
19:48 / 27.11.06
What I don't know is, more broadly, how that funny-talking gay European man is being presented. As I say, the character of Ricky Bobby is himself a caricature of a type of American the people who wrote, directed, starred in and funded the film may not have everyday familiarity with. Nonetheless, the structure of the narrative seems to suggest that it is with Ricky Bobby that we should be identifying - he is the protaganist, Jean Girard the antagonist. Perhaps, however, my innocence of the film means I have missed something - for example, Ricky Bobby may in fact be portrayed as a monster, an American grotesque who the viewer is also invited to despise. Casting against Ferrell's basic likability worked in Zoolander, after all, although there he was formally the bad guy. So, I'd like to fill in some of those blanks.



I'd say there is some ambiguity in the representation of Bobby and Girard as protagonist and antagonist. Girard is a smooth, wry, superior, intellectual. Bobby is a childlike, loveable innocent. Girard is coolly calculating, Bobby does it from love and instinct. There is little question he's the one we're meant to side with, out of the two. The distinction between them is probably as much to do with stereotypical "Americanness" and "Europeanness" (or specifically Frenchness) as it is "heterosexual" and "homosexual".

But Bobby's Americanness is at least gently parodied, I'd say ~ his Christianity is ludicrously naive, based around a literal imagining of the little baby Jesus "who's sittin' in his crib watchin the Baby Einstein videos, learnin' 'bout shapes and colors."

And there's a moment where Girard mockingly contrasts the US's cultural offerings with those of France ~ I think it's George W Bush vs the menage a trois ~ where there seems to be an invitation to think that actually, the Frenchman's got a good point.

The final scene is probably the most significant.

Ricky Bobby: I will not shake your hand, but I will give you this
[kisses Jean Girard]
Jean Girard: You taste of America.
Ricky Bobby: Thank you.

I think there's a few ways you could read that exchange.

Anyway, it's not an especially challenging or subversive film text, though it's not totally simple. SBC's role as a gay European is not a million miles away from his portrayal of Bruno, another gay European. (Though it is significantly different).
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
19:48 / 27.11.06
Is there a question in here?

Yes. The sentence begins "Why don't we". The word "why" there is what we call a "question word". Question words often introduce questions, which are also signaled by the use of the question mark at the end of the sentence.

Now, your responses are getting shorter and ruder, and you are getting more interested in insulting and picking fights with individuals rather than actually discussing the topic as the discussion moves beyond your interest and ability to engage with it. If you're going to do that, could you possibly just stick to the Doctor Who threads? It's just as tedious, but it is at least contained.
 
 
miss wonderstarr
19:58 / 27.11.06
Having not seen the film itself, might I inquire as to what prejudice he is seeking to satirise there? Or is it a more general satire on the absurdity of our cultural taboos against faeces at the dinner table?


I don't mean to "excuse" that scene, but I think the comedy point, such as it is, is to test the boundaries of the etiquette guide, who has been really very patient and generous with Borat up until then. And she actually handles the situation with kindness and aplomb. I suppose there's also a shock value for the viewer too, in terms of our own cultural taboos: "oh God, no, he hasn't has he..?"
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
20:15 / 27.11.06
But we _know_ he hasn't, right? That is, I'd assume we know in the same way that we know that he hasn't actually bought a used ice cream van from the used car salesman or hasn't really surprised Pamela Anderson Lee with a sack, and in something like, although not the same as, we know that John McCain has not actually just broken somebody's neck. Is the border between one fiction, in the sense of the artifices used in the creation of the film and the scenes in the film, and another kind of fiction, in which the viewer knows that the character of Borat is a fiction, but the other people in the camera's shooting angle do not. Surely it would be no more likely to assume that he had actually just defecated in a plastic bag than that he had some handy movie-making solution to the need to make it look as if he had defecated in a plastic bag, yes?

I mean, I suppose there is the method school - and for that matter, the Jackass school, which for all I know might defecate in plastic bags along with their other humorous stunts. But I'd kind of like to believe that SBC is more aware of the principles of movie-making economy than that.
 
 
some guy
20:45 / 27.11.06
The sentence begins "Why don't we".

Yes, but it doesn't seem to finish. I assume you were headed in the direction of "Why don't we think about ways in which the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen does X" but there doesn't appear to be an X in your post. I wanted to know if you had a question in there so that I could respond to it.

Now, your responses are getting shorter and ruder

None of my responses have been rude. All of my questions have been genuine. I wasn't aware length of post was a criteria for valid participation.

and you are getting more interested in trolling individuals rather than actually discussing the topic, as the discussion moves beyond your ability to engage with it.

Your telepathy is failing again. All of my questions have been genuine. There's no need to lapse into "silly Haus caricature" mode here.
 
 
some guy
20:51 / 27.11.06
This is one of the scenes I always flash to when I think of this film as being mean-spirited and misanthropic. There is no social commentary being made here, no culture clash being humorously underlined... what culture brings feces to the dining table? Knowing absolutely nothing about Kazakhstan I feel confident saying they don't literally shit where they eat - that's a human, cross-cultural taboo he's breaking, and so what is the point?

Does there need to be a point for it to be funny?

I think this scene is one that actually works against labeling the film mean-spirited and misanthropic, because the filmmakers show us that even then one of the hosts is concerned enough about Borat being made to feel welcome and fit in that she graciously volunteers to help him through a very awkward situation. If the motivation was just mean-spirited I'm not sure the audience would be allowed to see that response.

wc: I don't read Rolling Stone, is the article online?

I haven't read this link, but it appears to be the same article:
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
20:59 / 27.11.06
Ah, yes - you noticed but were not smart enough to correct the omission of an idea of comparing how the types of fiction differ. I apologise for assuming malice rather than stupidity, Lawrence, on no more evidence than several years of your attention-seeking iconoclasm lite.

For your benefit:

Why don't we think about ways in which the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen playing Jean Girard, the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen interacting with a shill - say, Pamela Anderson - the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen interacting with an unknowing member of the public - say, a driving instructor - and the fiction of a poor Romanian villager being filmed and then that film being given a humorous voiceover differ?

Glad I could help.
 
 
some guy
21:05 / 27.11.06
So out of myriad possibilities I'm stupid for not guessing the one you had in mind? Alrighty then.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
21:40 / 27.11.06
Sorry to hold the thread up, but this may be useful, For the last four or five years of Lawrence/Who Cares, I've been assuming that he was basically literate, and as such might have been sadly misunderstanding him. WC, could you state for the record that you had absolutely no idea what the missing word in that sentence could possibly be, and you felt that the best way to deal with that was one of your patented tiny posts (tm) - see here and here, here and here - none of which have, to my knowledge, succeeded in communicating any actually useful information, and many of which have held up the discussion while attempts are made to tease some sort of sense out of you.

If so, I apologise for treating you as an equal, if somewhat needy and socially awkward, interlocutor at any point in the past, and will endeavour to deal with you in future in a manner more befitting of your abilities. However, on the offy that there's a way back here, how about having a think about this:

Why don't we think about ways in which the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen playing Jean Girard, the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen interacting with a shill - say, Pamela Anderson - the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen interacting with an unknowing member of the public - say, a driving instructor - and the "fiction" of a poor Romanian villager being filmed and then that film being given a humorous voiceover differ?

Your choice, Lozzer.
 
 
ibis the being
21:50 / 27.11.06
I don't mean to "excuse" that scene, but I think the comedy point, such as it is, is to test the boundaries of the etiquette guide, who has been really very patient and generous with Borat up until then.

I see what you're saying but does it really test the boundaries of etiquette to bring poop to dinner? Or does it test the boundaries of basic hygiene? And is etiquette really something worth lampooning in the first place? So, some people like to have fancy dinners and use the right forks, who cares? I just don't get it, sorry.

Later in the scene he brings a (presumable actress playing) prostitute to the table and the reverend excuses himself (calmly and politely). I assume that this is meant to highlight the intolerance of the etiquette crowd and in particular the reverend, and I know that Christian reverends are an easy target these days, but let's pretend he really was a religious person and feels it would violate his beliefs to sit down to dinner with the prostitute. Does the scene have a different comedic value than, say, bringing your dog to a Muslim's house? The RS article, which I just read, says that Cohen keeps kosher - would it be a social commentary, or "just funny," if someone said they slipped a few jumbo shrimp into his kosher meal?

The Rolling Stone article, which by the way could not possibly crawl up Cohen's ass any more than it does, places this moment as its dramatic pinnacle:

"I remember, when I was in university I studied history, and there was this one major historian of the Third Reich, Ian Kershaw. And his quote was, 'The path to Auschwitz was paved with indifference.' I know it's not very funny being a comedian talking about the Holocaust, but I think it's an interesting idea that not everyone in Germany had to be a raving anti-Semite. They just had to be apathetic."

Baron Cohen doesn't make this grand statement with confidence. He makes it shyly, as if he's speaking out of turn.

If this is the "grand statement" of Cohen's work, my earlier undergrad comparison definitely still stands.
 
 
CameronStewart
22:27 / 27.11.06
>>>So, some people like to have fancy dinners and use the right forks, who cares? I just don't get it, sorry.<<<

It was an antebellum dinner party. There was a deliberately placed shot of the street sign naming the host mansion's address - it was "Secession Drive." Like the shots of the Confederate Flag bumper stickers and other memorabilia on sale at the antique store Borat destroys, it is meant to indicate - perhaps correctly, perhaps not - that the people Borat targets at these places cling to nostalgia of pre-Civil War (read: slavery-endorsing) USA.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
00:07 / 28.11.06
As an FYI - you're right about the prostitute, ibis/heron - she's played by Luenell, an Arkansas comic - her myspace page is here.

More broadly, there is a guide to some of the real/not real elements of the film in a Salon article (adview necessary, URL here).

I'm interested by Cameron's suggestion about the Confederate nostalgia of the dinner guests, because this introduces a complexity beyond it being either a simple shit gag or a humanist demonstration of the kindness and tolerance of people faced with this apparently childlike character holding a bag of poo. Does the scene have a kind of no-roses-without-manure (as it were) feel for you, Cameron? That these old-fashioned manners and politeness were inseparable from the nostalgic fetishisation of a world of rigid etiquette, but also of segregation, slavery and inequality?
 
 
some guy
00:26 / 28.11.06
Like the shots of the Confederate Flag bumper stickers and other memorabilia on sale at the antique store Borat destroys, it is meant to indicate - perhaps correctly, perhaps not - that the people Borat targets at these places cling to nostalgia of pre-Civil War (read: slavery-endorsing) USA.

It's not a coincidence that Borat's cross-country trip takes a Southern route. IIRC many of his appearances on the HBO version of Da Ali G Show were also in the South. I think it's a case of (perhaps ostensibly) easy targets more than anything else.
 
 
miss wonderstarr
06:30 / 28.11.06
I'm still not sure about the "poop in a bag" scene and whether it can be seen to have a political point ~ like the driving instructor and comedy-guidance scene, it seems partly about how far a patient person's tolerance can be pushed, and to an extent it might invite the viewer to feel some warmth and admiration towards the person who continues to try and help Borat despite his deliberate, faux-naive provocation and apparent inability to understand what he's been told.

So maybe that's a different form of comedy in the same scene. I do think what Cameron identified is present in this sequence (made up of other scenes, including the antique shop), and I've read reviews that suggested it was the prostitute's Blackness that ended the dinner party so suddenly. Personally I do feel some sympathy for a Christian reverend whose dinner party is interrupted by a prostitute, and in a way it could be said he dealt with the situation reasonably (even admirably) according to his own moral and spiritual code (standing up immediately, shaking hands with Borat and declaring that he has to leave). If a religious leader of another faith had been faced with a person whose job and clothing offended his spiritual principles, I'd also expect him to excuse himself politely and take off.

However, if the point is that the dinner party breaks up in alarm because a Black woman enters the house, that's a different matter, and it's making a different point. Perhaps because of my own cultural background (English) I wasn't sure, when watching it, exactly what aspect of Borat's guest was causing them such immediate offence.
 
 
ibis the being
14:03 / 28.11.06
It was an antebellum dinner party. There was a deliberately placed shot of the street sign naming the host mansion's address - it was "Secession Drive." Like the shots of the Confederate Flag bumper stickers and other memorabilia on sale at the antique store Borat destroys, it is meant to indicate - perhaps correctly, perhaps not - that the people Borat targets at these places cling to nostalgia of pre-Civil War (read: slavery-endorsing) USA.

Ah, I had forgotten about that. Now I get it - they were disgusted by poop at the table because they're racist.

I'm not picking on Cameron, by the way, I just think this film is so lazy, it bothers the hell out of me. So Cohen sets up the target - they're Confederate Southerners - then freaks them out so we can laugh at them. I guess I'm a big mush but I don't think it's right to kick people, even racist people, just for existing... kick them for being racist, fine. The culture of the American South is more complex than We Love Slavery... it's problematic and painful and often horrible but to me a road sign named "Secession Drive" is not a free pass to barge in and humiliate people.

Only if you really stretch can you argue that the actress's black skin was the reason the dinner party broke up. The woman was wearing a super short mini skirt and her belly was hanging out of her top. She came in making it clear that she was just meeting Borat. The mental math wasn't too hard for the other guests.

I have to admit that part of my bad reaction to that scene was that I didn't realize until later in the movie that the prostitute was an actress... so I thought he was taking a real woman out (later also to the bar) as some kind of sideshow exhibit to be ridiculed and possibly even endangered it made me cringe like crazy. Again the roleplaying makes the whole thing confusing. If I accept that she's an actress does that make it okay to laugh about a foreigner bringing a black, fat (since it seems her size is part of the joke), barely clothed sex worker to a country bar to ride the bull while her skirt rides up around her waist? Cringe, cringe, cringe. Way more uncomfortable than funny to me.
 
 
Janean Patience
16:04 / 28.11.06
Randy: Love Thy Neighbour was a racist pile of shit.

It sure was. It just made me laugh to try and think of a right-wing interpretation of a comedy that was right-wing British racism at its zenith. Stupid of me to muddy the thread with it, though.

Haus: I was hoping very much to see Talladega Nights last night, but the in-flight entertainment was busted. Failure to Launch, by God. However, am I not right in thinking that in that film Sacha Baron Cohen plays a French racing driver who is gay? One who has a male partner called Gregory?

Failure To Launch. The horror the horror. Anyway, the estimable Miss Wonderstarr has already articulated my feelings on Cohen's character in Talladega Nights; the Frenchman was exactly what American grotesque Ricky Bobby, and his redneck chums, was terrifed of. The alien, racing them while reading Sartre and drinking expresso, who ultimately leads the way out of a blinkered redneck universe.

All of which is to overanalyse a dumb, funny movie. My point was that Cohen likes a funny voice, and these funny voices aren't used solely against minorities that are feared or hated. Whatever you think about funny voices, I wouldn't say his use of them made him a bigot.

Back on Borat, I understand that there is a scene in which he pretends to have defecated into a plastic bag and brings it downstairs to a dinner party at the Magnolia Springs Manor. Having not seen the film itself, might I inquire as to what prejudice he is seeking to satirise there? Or is it a more general satire on the absurdity of our cultural taboos against faeces at the dinner table?

A variety of opinions on the subject have been aired already. Personally, I'd say there was no satirical intent at all. Cohen's characters develop into cartoons or clowns from their satirical bases, and the bag of crap was simply taking that further. Well acted, though - the embarrassed way he slunk back into the room, concealing it, ashamed of his own lack of sophistication, managed to convince the etiquette expert that he was genuine, and made her kind reaction all the more funny. Cohen's characters use unwitting straight men, and often expose prejudice. Sometimes, though, as when he falls in the antique shop and smashes china, the comedy lies in us watching a clown and the people surrounding him taking him entirely seriously.

I'm also interested in the recent legal action brought by the inhabitants of Glod, the Romanian village used for the "Kazakhstan" scenes. These people are not having their attitudes to sexuality, race or gender challenged - they are not, as far as one can tell, given very much rope at all to talk about their politics - they are paid four dollars or so a day to have a voiceover identify them as rapists or simpletons in a movie to be shown globally. Again, who is the joke on there, and what is it?

The joke is that this is a person from a backward society in our terms, and we're being shown how backward this place is. The extras in the scene are, well, extras. They didn't understand what was going on just as the Moroccans in life of Brian didn't know what they were shouting at Mary. They're brought in to play a narrative function. It seems a strange argument to say they should have been made aware of all the possible ramifications of appearing in a film, and more so to say that their attitudes to sexuality, race or gender should be challenged. I don't think even the audience had those challenged, as I've already stated.

The people of Kazakhstan could claim they've been the victims of bigotry after this film, which portrays them as simple-minded anti-semites dazzled by Western consumerism and sexuality. It's a dictatorship where human rights are much-abused but apparently religious freedom is better than in most countries. In the lack of other information, though, as an ex-Soviet state, it's probable that the level of anti-semitism is pretty high. It certainly is in the Ukraine.

I'm not a massive fan of Sacha Baron Cohen's work or anything, you know. I never much liked Borat on TV though I laughed pretty consistently at the film. What interests me is that so many people felt uncomfortable watching it and there doesn't appear to be a solid reason why. If there's any evidence he's a bigot then I'm happy to hear it. Yawn's assertion that Cohen is a Muslim-hating Jew would appear to be the most believable and substantial, though that doesn't really work in Ali G's case and certainly doesn't in Bruno's. Otherwise, what have we got? He can be unfunny, that's no hate crime, but why did he make so many posters feel uncomfortable?
 
 
TeN
16:31 / 28.11.06
anyone in this thread who hasn't read the Rolling Stone article yet needs to

it's the first time Cohen has been interviewed out of character and it sheds some light upon so many of the issues we've discussed

some exceprts I thought were relevant:

"When Baron Cohen first heard that the Kazakh government was thinking of suing him and placing a full-page ad promoting the country in The New York Times, he was editing his movie in Los Angeles. His reaction: 'I was surprised, because I always had faith in the audience that they would realize that this was a fictitious country and the mere purpose of it was to allow people to bring out their own prejudices. And the reason we chose Kazakhstan was because it was a country that no one had heard anything about, so we could essentially play on stereotypes they might have about this ex-Soviet backwater. The joke is not on Kazakhstan. I think the joke is on people who can believe that the Kazakhstan that I describe can exist -- who believe that there's a country where homosexuals wear blue hats and the women live in cages and they drink fermented horse urine and the age of consent has been raised to nine years old.'"

"'Borat essentially works as a tool,' Baron Cohen says. 'By himself being anti-Semitic, he lets people lower their guard and expose their own prejudice, whether it's anti-Semitism or an acceptance of anti-Semitism. 'Throw the Jew Down the Well' [a song performed at a country & western bar during Da Ali G Show] was a very controversial sketch, and some members of the Jewish community thought that it was actually going to encourage anti-Semitism. But to me it revealed something about that bar in Tucson. And the question is: Did it reveal that they were anti-Semitic? Perhaps. But maybe it just revealed that they were indifferent to anti-Semitism. I remember, when I was in university I studied history, and there was this one major historian of the Third Reich, Ian Kershaw. And his quote was, 'The path to Auschwitz was paved with indifference.' I know it's not very funny being a comedian talking about the Holocaust, but I think it's an interesting idea that not everyone in Germany had to be a raving anti-Semite. They just had to be apathetic.'"

"There is a certain sadism to Baron Cohen, who seems most comfortable when making others uncomfortable. To some degree, Borat and Ali G are safe refuges for him, masks he can hide behind. If everything that comes out of your mouth is parody, then you never have to be accountable for what you say -- because you didn't really mean it anyway. You only said it to lead your interview subjects to the thin line between patience and intolerance in order for their true personality to reveal itself. In contrast, Baron Cohen himself has no defenses or alibis. One wonders if he could withstand the awkward situations to which he constantly exposes his alter egos. 'I think I'd find it hard to,' he admits. 'I think you can hide behind the characters and do things that you yourself find difficult.'"


I wish the entire thing was online, because there's a lot more... the part about how the Ali G character originated is particularly relevant because it debunks yawn's theory about the character being an attack on arabs. he says that the character was based on a white hip-hop DJ on BBC Radio 1 and that the name Ali G was later given by one of the show's producers because he felt that with an ethnic name, interviewees would be less likely to get angry with Cohen for fear of being labeled racist.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
17:02 / 28.11.06
Do you mean that it's the first time SBC has been interviewed out of character since the release of Borat, TeN? I linked to an interview he did as Sacha Baron Cohen on the Daily Show some time ago.

In the lack of other information, though, as an ex-Soviet state, it's probable that the level of anti-semitism is pretty high. It certainly is in the Ukraine.

The distance between the Ukraine and Kazakhstan at their narrowest point is only about the size of Thailand, but I wouldn't fancy your chances of doing it in a day. Perhaps the absence of further information might be a useful goad to find some further information in this context?
 
 
CameronStewart
17:03 / 28.11.06
>>>to me a road sign named "Secession Drive" is not a free pass to barge in and humiliate people.<<<

This is certainly true, and it's also true that unlike the rodeo manager or the frat boys, who unambiguously hung themselves with their own words and thus eliminated (for me) any sympathy, there's very little evidence that the dinner party guests were inherently racist because of their street address. Perhaps if they had said on-camera something about how their formal etiquette and dinner parties were representative of a desire to return to Confederate values and intimated that slavery was a good thing, then there might be a case that they "deserved" what they got. I think even the antique store selling (modern) confederate memorabilia is reasonably damning, moreso than the dinner party. Much has been made elsewhere of the prostitute's race being the reason for the dinner party ending, but I think there's been some editing and we're not seeing the whole picture - we go in a split second from the hosts reacting with shock but surprising grace at a bag of shit being brought to the table, to them throwing the film crew out and threatening to call the police as soon as the "guest" arrives. The suggestion here is that a black prostitute is worse than a bag of shit, but the turn in attitude happens so abruptly that I can't help but think that they did something else to really provoke the dinner guests, that was not included in the final film.

But god help me I laughed really hard at this scene, and the rest of the movie. Does that make me a terrible person?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
17:07 / 28.11.06
Incidentally, WFTD, the only person who has said that they were "uncomfortable" with the film in this thread is Ibis, who explained specifically what she was uncomfortable with:


I have to admit that part of my bad reaction to that scene was that I didn't realize until later in the movie that the prostitute was an actress... so I thought he was taking a real woman out (later also to the bar) as some kind of sideshow exhibit to be ridiculed and possibly even endangered it made me cringe like crazy. Again the roleplaying makes the whole thing confusing. If I accept that she's an actress does that make it okay to laugh about a foreigner bringing a black, fat (since it seems her size is part of the joke), barely clothed sex worker to a country bar to ride the bull while her skirt rides up around her waist? Cringe, cringe, cringe. Way more uncomfortable than funny to me.

So, might I ask where you're getting the idea that people are "uncomfortable" in this thread?
 
 
some guy
18:12 / 28.11.06
The suggestion here is that a black prostitute is worse than a bag of shit, but the turn in attitude happens so abruptly that I can't help but think that they did something else to really provoke the dinner guests, that was not included in the final film.

I agree that it appears something has been edited based on the hosts' reactions to Borat's previous shenanigans. But while there are trappings that could perhaps lead certain audience members to conclude racism is at work, none of those feature in the dinner scenes and we're never given reason to believe the problem with Borat's guest is her race rather than her occupation. In this sense the filmmakers could be exposing the viewers' own prejudices (left and right) in addition to those of the people on screen.

We can't even be sure they're being thrown out because she's a prostitute - I saw it as nothing more than the straw that broke the camel's back. IIRC it's the minister who gets up to leave first, and Borat had been goading him all night (the remarks about his wife etc).
 
 
TeN
21:47 / 28.11.06
"Do you mean that it's the first time SBC has been interviewed out of character since the release of Borat, TeN?"
yes, that's what I meant to write
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
22:12 / 28.11.06
Gotcha. Thanks.
 
 
Janean Patience
09:25 / 29.11.06
Haus: The distance between the Ukraine and Kazakhstan at their narrowest point is only about the size of Thailand, but I wouldn't fancy your chances of doing it in a day. Perhaps the absence of further information might be a useful goad to find some further information in this context?

I mentioned the Ukraine because that's where the Kazakhstan scenes were filmed. I didn't think it was a neighbour, though I admit I thought they were closer than they are. Having also said Life of Brian was filmed in Morocco when it was Tunisia, perhaps I should have paid attention in geography lessons rather than reading Sweet Valley High books but oh, Elizabeth and Jessica, how can one twin be so bad when the other is so good?

Accurate information on racial and sexual politics in Kazakhstan isn't easy to find on the internet, and I'm not in a position to look anywhere else right now. Examining what the media have written about Borat and the Kazakhstan reaction, it's all propaganda from official sources. The what-does-the-man-in-the-Kazakhstan-street-think-of-Borat pieces, which newspapers would certainly have tried to get, are notably absent. The country's a dictatorship, so it could well be that media access is strictly controlled. Maybe that's why it's a blank slate for Cohen to project his parodies onto. Either way, I couldn't find out anything about the country which is germane to Borat's attitudes to women, racial minorities, homosexuality or indeed his toilet habits.

Going back to the Ukraine for a moment, it occurs that Borat's literary antecendent is Alex, the translator in Jonathan Safran Foer's Everything Is Illuminated. Again obsessed with the cars, women and bright lights of America, again reflexively anti-semitic. Borat pre-dates Alex by two years, but perhaps attitudes to Jews in ex-Soviet states are reasonably consistent across the countries? Just a thought.

Might I ask where you're getting the idea that people are "uncomfortable" in this thread?

Well, Tom Coates said he was sort of troubled by the whole Borat thing, Bonzoid agreed, Gladys was laughing my arse off but still finding a lot of it troublesome and Ibis was extremely uncomfortable with what I felt was an unrelentingly misanthropic point of view on Cohen's part.

That's pretty far from a consensus, however, so my assertion that many posters are uncomfortable should be stricken from the record. I think I was bringing in general media discomfort; the number of Guardian articles alone (and another one today) show that people aren't sure about Borat but neither are they sure why. It's a cloud of unknowing that's been hanging over Cohen since the Ali G days. Joe #11, earlier on the thread, was sure of Cohen's bigotry but hasn't come back with evidence. Is there any, or is perception of him as offending entirely subjective?
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
09:35 / 29.11.06
I don't need to provide evidence when you provide it for me:

The joke is that this is a person from a backward society in our terms, and we're being shown how backward this place is.

Does anyone really need me to explain this? Are we really going to have to get that 101?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:36 / 29.11.06
I mentioned the Ukraine because that's where the Kazakhstan scenes were filmed.

The Kazakhstan scenes were filmed in the Romanian village of Glod. You may recall that I said:

I'm also interested in the recent legal action brought by the inhabitants of Glod, the Romanian village used for the "Kazakhstan" scenes.

You quoted this sentence in your post to this thread, here. I have no idea where the Ukraine comes in. I also have no idea why you feel that a fictitious character in a novel by Jonathan Safran Foer, whom you describe as an "antecedent" despite also saying that Borat predates the character by two years, should be taken along with a fictitious character (Borat) to demonstrate a similarity in attitudes to Jews in two actual countries. Essentially, I think you've pretty much stopped making sense here. Would you like perhaps to go back and have another go at those paragraphs?
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
09:41 / 29.11.06
Also, in response to this:

My point was that Cohen likes a funny voice, and these funny voices aren't used solely against minorities that are feared or hated. Whatever you think about funny voices, I wouldn't say his use of them made him a bigot.

Has he done any characters which hilariously mock the backwardness of people from his own privileged background, then?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:53 / 29.11.06
King Julien in Madagascar, maybe? Although I think the comic highlight of that performance was a rendition of I like to Move It, so maybe not...
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:57 / 29.11.06
While we're here:

I think I was bringing in general media discomfort; the number of Guardian articles alone (and another one today) show that people aren't sure about Borat but neither are they sure why.

I don't think I follow the reasoning here: the Guardian has lots of articles about Iraq, but it does not follow that this demonstrates that "people" are not sure about Iraq but are not sure why. In fact, Marcel Berlins, writing in the Guardian today, makes absolutely clear why he disliked the film Borat. To quote:

The humour of humiliation has become distressingly popular. The success of the film Borat is the latest example. I disliked it and was angered by it. I admit to laughing quite often because parts of it are very funny, but those parcels of enjoyment were trivial when set against the film's essential cruelty. I am not referring to the jokes that send up national, ethnic or religious stereotypes and characteristics. There were plenty of those, some of which were in bad taste and offensive but often hilarious. Fine. My objection is to the exploitation of the naive, the trusting and the ignorant for the sake of a joke. What Borat did was to inveigle ordinary, harmless people into participating in what was promised to be a documentary; the real motive was to abuse their cooperation by making them the objects of ridicule. It may be acceptable to exercise such methods to expose, in the public interest, someone's criminality, corruption or hypocrisy. To do so for the sake of cheap laughs is reprehensible. Borat, Sacha Baron Cohen's character, managed to extract from a few of his pathetic victims some loutish behaviour and racist remarks; they may not have been nice people, but that hardly justifies the effort put in to make them look silly. But by no means all his hapless victims could provide the excuse that they were unpleasant and therefore somehow deserved their treatment. What criteria were used to decide those innocents were ripe for transformation into international laughing stocks? None, other than getting the laugh. That is not enough of a reason.

One would have to try quite hard not to see in that a reason why Marcel Berlins did not like the film. The use of "uncomfortable" here, if I might editorialise, seems to be following the reality tunnels argument - people are "uncomfortable" with Borat because he is stretching their reality tunnels. He is messing with their minds. Mark Kermode summed up the marketing of the film as being "If you don't like this film, you are stupid" on his film review section on Radio 5 - this is pretty much the reality tunnels argument. However, I don't think it's a complete summary of the discussion of the film available, even in this thread and much less in the wider world.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
10:57 / 29.11.06
Speaking purely personally, I'd say that there are elements of the comic proposition of the film Borat with which I am uncomfortable, not particularly because I feel my reality tunnels being stretched, but because it seems to be hitting soft targets - for example, the poverty-stricken inhabitants of Glod, whom WFTD describes as "backward" - for the enjoyment of ... well, of people who find watching a western comedian getting the better of poor people living in an unusually poor part of a poor country amusing, really. Of course, it could be that the production company is right, that the villagers were paid well, that Cohen donated money to their school, that they were all in on the joke and that their subsequent unhappiness with their portrayal is opportunistic. On t'other hand, I'm a leetle bit conflicted about the message there - we gave the gypsies a handout, and now the gypsies are looking for another handout. Given that the other key plank of the defence is that the film exposes and shames racism and racists, this seems to be a bit of a ticklish approach to take.
 
 
yawn - thing's buddy
11:58 / 29.11.06
Ten: my 'theory' was not about SBC being anti-arab, it was about him being anti-muslim.

also, yeah, it's true that there is a big link between Tim westwood and ali G - but its fleshed out with observations of 'miggas' too.

I'd also like to point out that SBC's reason's for using Khazakstan is dumb. Why not just invent a country?

furthermore, I have no proof but I suspect anti-semitism is higher in ex-christian soviet countries (ukraine) than in ex-muslim ones (such as k-stan).

then again, aparently many poles and ukrainians were resettled in Khazakstan by Stalin.
 
 
some guy
14:15 / 29.11.06
Speaking purely personally, I'd say that there are elements of the comic proposition of the film Borat with which I am uncomfortable, not particularly because I feel my reality tunnels being stretched, but because it seems to be hitting soft targets - for example, the poverty-stricken inhabitants of Glod, whom WFTD describes as "backward" - for the enjoyment of ... well, of people who find watching a western comedian getting the better of poor people living in an unusually poor part of a poor country amusing, really.

I'm a little confused by this, because SBC doesn't actually make fun of the poverty-stricken residents of Glod in the film. We're presented with an obviously fictional comedy set piece that nobody in the audience is going to take as an unvarnished documentary look at reality. None of the extras are mocked; those picked out on camera are given obviously false biographies that nobody is going to take seriously. They're essentially playing characters due to Borat's narration. The approach isn't far removed from the recontextualization undertaken by MST3K or MXC or even some of the clips employed by Monty Python, although of course people might take issue with it there, too.

Has anyone read the contract between the production team and Glod?
 
 
some guy
14:17 / 29.11.06
The joke is that this is a person from a backward society in our terms, and we're being shown how backward this place is.
Does anyone really need me to explain this? Are we really going to have to get that 101?

Can you explain it for me? Especially in light of SBC pointing out that the joke is actually on people who believe his absurdly fictionalized version of Kazakhstan can possibly exist?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
14:25 / 29.11.06
But here's a chance for a bit of a thought experiment, WC. Why don't we think about ways in which the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen playing Jean Girard, the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen interacting with a shill - say, Pamela Anderson, - the "fiction" of Sacha Baron Cohen interacting with an unknowing member of the public - say, a driving instructor - and the fiction of a poor Romanian villager being filmed and then that film being given a humorous voiceover differ?
 
  

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