When
Sacha Baron Cohen shocked movie goers with his 2006 release, Borat:
Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of
Kazakhstan, the faux documentary met its share of controversy with its
scathing ambush-style comedy. The question after the damage was done
and lots of box-office money was made was how could Baron Cohen top
himself? Was this a hilarious fluke? How could lightning strike twice
in the same place?
Taking another character from
the painfully short-lived Da Ali G show, Baron Cohen blasts the answer
to those questions with a double-barreled shotgun of audacity and
brilliance resulting in one of the most outrageous comedies ever
filmed.
Flamboyantly gay Austrian
television host Brüno has made his last embarrassing gaffe on the German
fashion programme, Funkyzeit Mit Brüno. It’s just as well, because
Deutschland was just too small a strudel stand to contain Brüno’s
fabulosity; our young man has decided to go west. Armed with his
faithful assistant, Lutz, Brüno plans his rise to Hollywood über fame.
Taking pages from the biggest celebrities, Brüno hires an agent, makes
the best of extra roles, attempts to recreate his German show for U.S.
audiences, makes a special contribution to the Middle East peace process
and adopts an African baby. When all his efforts come to nothing, the
fey fashionista is desperate enough to abandon his homosexuality,
joining a sexual re-orientation ministry, the National Guard and a
swingers’ club. What price fame, indeed?
If there’s a comparison to be
made, Sacha Baron Cohen’s comedy is probably closest to that of Andy
Kaufman. In his early days in featured segments on Saturday Night Live,
the public had no idea who the guy was and Kaufman’s odd and often
obnoxious characters were accepted at face value. Kaufman was often
assaulted by the unaware rubes displeased to find themselves enmeshed in
the comedian’s bizarre skits. Going further than he ever did with
Borat, in Brüno, Baron Cohen literally risks life and limb for laughs;
disparaging Osama Bin Laden’s fashion sense to the leader of an
extremist terrorist group, being chased down a street in Israel by a
enraged mob of Hasidic rabbis who don’t appreciate his spin on
traditional Orthodox garb and making passes at an unreceptive and
well-armed bunch of good ‘ol boy hunters during his “straight” phase.
He endures being viciously whipped by a frightening dominatrix when he
refuses to participate in a hetero orgy. Baron Cohen even hazards a
Secret Service-issued beat down and instant deportation after trying to
persuade former Presidential candidate Ron Paul into helping him make
the sex tape that will surely make Brüno a household name.
The amount of frontal male
nudity and hysterical illustrations of gay sex (- hidden behind
perilously narrow black bars) makes me wonder how Brüno got by with
a mere R rating. In Brüno’s world, the plentiful penises dance, do
acrobatics and even speak - all in close up. Even Brüno’s exercise bike
multitasks in a very inventive way. Who was asleep at the MPAA wheel?
The fact that Baron Cohen was able to get this stuff onscreen at all is
an achievement in subversive genius.
Amongst the many topical
sacred cows flayed in the film are the ruthless stage parents who, on
behalf of their small children, accede to increasingly disturbing
demands made for a photo shoot. Immigrant day labourers cheerfully
acquiesce to being used as furniture when Bruno fails to prepare for a
day of celebrity interviews. And then there’s the whole gay thing … The
five-hundred pound gorilla of the film is our dashing protagonist’s
unabashed, unfettered homosexuality. Baron Cohen forces his audience to
face any prejudices about gays by making Brüno’s in-your-face sexuality
over the top enough to be a caricature, yet establishing that the campy,
raunchy affect is simply who he is. When Brüno is willing to give that
up, it’s actually kind of sad, as is the unrequited adoration from his
not-fabulous-enough manager/Guy Friday, Lutz, who gives up his life in
Germany to support his spoiled, vain love. If there is a moral to all
Brüno’s debauchery it’s in its “be yourself” message, which is cannily
applied paired with the well-worn “Hollywood is fake” homily. Only the
flash forward ending drags a little but makes up for the weight in the
pure nihilism of exposing an extreme fighting audience to erotic sights
they’ve never seen before as Brüno dramatically comes to terms with who
he is.
What one must wonder after
Borat is if there was anyone on the planet not clued into Baron Cohen’s
approach of filming unsuspecting dupes and getting them to say or do
things they’ll regret in front of millions? That a Hollywood agent and
indeed the entire set of NBC’s Medium wouldn’t know the star of one of
the biggest blockbuster comedies ever made, despite his blonde-streaked
page boy coiffure, seems a bit far-fetched. I could say the same about
Paula Abdul’s furniture-free interview (- and one with LaToya
Jackson, later cut), but maybe in these instances Baron Cohen chose
his quarry well.
Brüno is one of the most
successful satires of Hollywood absurdity and the pursuit of celebrity
at any cost. Of all the film’s perversities, the ultimate one may be
that Brüno will make tons of money for its Hollywood movie studio while
thumbing its nose at the system the entire time.
If Borat had the initial spark
of being the first project that exposed the world to Baron Cohen’s
perilous brand of agit-comedy, Brüno is more cohesive, more
envelope-pushing and overall, a funnier film. So, we’re back to square
one with Sacha Baron Cohen and wondering how, after the riotous,
hysterical Brüno, he could possibly outdo himself once again? I can’t
wait to find out.
~ The Lady Miz Diva
July 5th, 2009
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