Borat can’t pretend it’s satire while being racist and sexist, pure and simple
When Borat was released in 2006, I didnât see it (I was 12) â but I had a strong sense of the joy it inspired in my classmates. The film, which follows a fictitious bigoted Kazakh journalist to America, where he says the unsayable and documents American prejudice on his merry way, resonated deeply with teenage boys in the early Noughties: the mankini, the toilet humour, the [Borat voice] âvery niceâ, which would often echo across the classroom. In my mind, it fit squarely alongside the juvenile humour offered by South Park, Little Britain, and another of writer and actor Sacha Baron Cohenâs creations, Ali G Indahouse.
So, upon the release of this monthâs new Borat movie: Borat Subsequent Moviefilm: Delivery of Prodigious Bribe to American Regime for Make Benefit Once Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, I was surprised to learn that Borat is actually broadly loved by critics on what appears to be a deeply intellectual level; and that the new instalment, which sees Borat return to the US with his daughter Tutar to take on anti-maskers and Trump supporters, would prove a massive hit.
So, if like me, you had never really engaged that much, or were a child when the concept of Borat first graced the cultural landscape, hereâs the deal. The common intellectual case for Borat is that the film is satirical. Yes, while the character himself is racist, sexist and bigoted in a number of other ways, this is instrumental in coaxing Americans (often Republicans) into feeling comfortable enough to expose that they hold those views themselves.
While Borat is fictional, the politicians and people he interacts with are real â and the fact that they not only believe that Borat is a real Kazakh, but often feel able to reveal their own racism and sexism when they interact with him, is shown as proof that the joke is on Americans, Republicans, racists and sexists. By taking aim at these groups, Borat punches up, and so avoids being offensive. Or at least that is the case for Borat held up by both liberal critics, and Baron Cohen himself. But does it work in practice?
Iâm not so sure itâs as simple as this. One early sign that Boratâs concept was failing back in 2006 was that the film was banned in Kazakhstan, due to its portrayal of the country as antisemitic, sexist, and broadly âbackwardsâ. Not in a subtle way, but in an obscene one. Borat, like many other natives of his hometown, celebrates the Holocaust (for added context, Baron Cohen is Jewish himself). Stories from Boratâs village also casually reference incest and rape. As a satirist, Baron Cohen is supposedly rehashing an old joke about Americansâ ignorance of other cultures â heâs not showing the real Kazakhstan, but what Americans think about countries like Kazakhstan.
But in practice, it seems Borat actually does more harm than good for the underrepresented country, particularly considering Kazakh people launched a petition against the new film, signed by 110,000 people. Numerous additional accounts from Kazakh people, particularly the few living in the US and UK, have demonstrated that many British and American people do in fact think that Borat is a realistic representation of Kazakhstan. This poses the question: despite Baron Cohenâs stated intention, how can we be sure that all audiences âgetâ the nuance of such a high-risk joke? And in terms of the filmâs wide and disparate fanbase â are the 30-something film critics and the 13-year-old schoolboys really laughing at the same thing?
Kazakh people are not the only ones unhappy with how Borat showed the country onscreen. The âKazakhstanâ scenes in the original Borat, which show people living in abject poverty, were filmed in Glod, a Roma village in Romania. The villagers seen in the film are real residents of Glod, who later took legal action against the film, claiming they were exploited, misled and humiliated. One Roma community leader alleged that villagers were told it was a documentary rather than a comedy. He also said community members were each paid around three euros for the privilege of Baron Cohen branding specific unwitting villagers as town ârapistsâ or âabortionistsâ, or installing cows in their homes. Is this still punching up?
To clarify its politics, there are parts of Subsequent Moviefilm supposedly intended to demonstrate to audiences that victims of racism and sexism can be good people (in case you didnât already know). Unfortunately, they too end up being treated as fodder for audience chuckles. Take Jeanise Jones, Tutarâs 62-year-old babysitter, who grows concerned about the exploitative nature of Boratâs relationship with his daughter, and attempts to take the young woman under her wing and give her guidance, woman-to-woman. Jones is one of the few sympathetic characters in the film, yet she gets the same âBorat treatmentâ his most abominable interviewees do â with a side serving of racism â as he asks her: âWill you be my new black wife?â Itâs painful to watch and you end up feeling sorry for Jones, who has now spoken out about feeling âbetrayedâ by the film. She told Page Six: âThey told me it was a documentary for this young lady to understand she has rights and she can do whatever a man can do. I felt pain for her.â
The film undoubtedly raises old questions about what satire can actually achieve. In the current climate, Iâm highly sceptical of the idea that mimicking the most obvious face of bigotry will do anything to truly challenge it. Writer Jason Osamede Okundaye articulated this well in a takedown of the âironic racismâ genre earlier this year: âBaron Cohen secures his cultural cachet through baiting and caricaturing what liberal, bourgeois audiences consider to be the unfashionable, stupid and obnoxious face of racism â all the while giving oxygen to abominable views.â
Itâs been stated time and time again that in Trumpâs America, there is ever-shrinking wiggle room for satire â the president is a reality TV star who makes shout-outs to neo-fascist groups on national television. Ultimately, this is the most glaring new pitfall that emerges in Subsequent Moviefilm; racist views are no longer secret, taboo disclosures quietly revealed to a foreign documentarian â theyâre rife across Facebook, theyâre in the White House, and many fascists will gladly put their names to their opinions. As one reviewer wrote for Time Out: âWant to gawp at white supremacists flaunting their Nazi ideology at a rally? Turn on the news.â
So, since Baron Cohen is not telling us anything we donât already know, what, really, is Borat doing? If the racism and sexism can no longer even justify itself as a means to an end to expose some greater truth⦠isnât it just racism and sexism plain and simple?
The more I hear critics I usually align with continuing to wax lyrical about Subsequent Moviefilm, the more confused Iâve grown. Maybe, in these times, the bar is low.
Thatâs not to say there arenât good parts of Subsequent Moviefilm. The moments where Baron Cohen cleanly punches up are the strongest, such as when he storms a Conservative conference dressed as Trump, and is dragged out. There are also tangible positive things that may come out of this project â for example, I do genuinely believe that its final stunt involving Trumpâs personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani might make a dent in the course of the US election. But unfortunately, for Borat, many others are collateral damage.
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