I think that Sacha Baron Cohen is one of the most talented people in today’s comedy. I’ve seen and appreciated much of his work. If you aren’t too familiar with it, among other things, he is mostly famous for creating three characters which appear on a number of shows and television programs – Borat, Ali G, and Bruno. Each one of those characters is very different from the others, and all three are very different from Sacha Baron Cohen himself.  My favorite one is Ali G, which I mentioned a few times on this blog. Other ones are funny too, but they don’t get me laughing as hard as Ali G.
One of these characters was taken as far as a full featured movie – “Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan“. I was trying a bit to avoid watching this film, because, although as funny as the character is, I thought it would be a bit too much. After listening to a few friends of mine, who strongly recommended the movie (and referred and quoted it way too often), I decided to finally rent and watch it.
I’m glad I did. It was indeed much more than I expected out of it. Borat is a character who does a lot of exploration in cultural differences and stereotypes. In this movie there was as much space for those explorations as one could get. And he utilized it all. It was unbelievable at times. Sometimes Borat goes so far that it is impossible to believe that scenes weren’t done in the studio with hired actors. After reading a bit about the movie after watching it, and after seeing a few interviews at YouTube, it seems that those scenes indeed took place as part of Borat’s life and not as staged movie scenes. All I can say for that is – WOW!
I strongly recommend this film, if you aren’t easily upset by all sorts of humor (including toilet jokes, discrimination, sexual themes, slavery and human rights, etc).
Strong 7 out of 10 with extra points for bravery and hard work and sensitive areas.