It's no wonder then that the Kazakh government sends Borat to "US and A" to learn important lessons for his "glorious" but backward homeland. What starts out as a fact-finding mission takes an unexpected turn, however, when Borat catches an episode of "Baywatch" on his hotel television, falls in love with Pamela Anderson and resolves to make her his bride.
Borat is one of a triumvirate of journalists played by British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen on his HBO series "Da Ali G Show." In addition to Borat there is Ali G, a suburban gangster and Cohen's most famous alter-ego, and Bruno, a flamboyantly gay man from Austria.
The Cambridge-educated Cohen is the brightest star of what has come to be known as "cringe comedy," a genre that consists of vulgar, offensive and uniquely improvisational performances meant to elicit awkward or embarrassing reactions from persons of interest and the audience. Perhaps because his alter-egos are so disarmingly stupid, Cohen has the spectacular ability to expose the ignorance and prejudice of his interviewees, which have included such notable celebrities as Kobe Bryant, Pat Buchanan and Noam Chomsky.
Cohen's character of Borat is a naïve Central Asian bumpkin. Borat is a hilariously oblivious racist, misogynist and anti-Semite, and Cohen exploits this personality in order to reveal what's racist, misogynist and anti-Semitic about America.
In his cross-country journey from New York to California, Borat meets and interviews various Americans whose intolerance is at once laughable and scary. When Borat is invited to sing the national anthem at a rodeo in Virginia, he proclaims that the Kazakh people "support your war of terror!" and is greeted with a thunderous applause. Later, when Borat enters a gun store and asks which firearm would best be suited to "defend against a Jew," the storeowner pauses before replying: "I'd recommend a .45 or a 9-millimeter."
At once uproariously funny and weirdly depressing, Cohen's gags cultivate a sharp tension in audience members; we laugh because the jokes are funny, but we cringe because we worry that they shouldn't be and because Borat's misadventures reveal America's legitimately ugly side. (Don't worry, however, there are plenty of comparably innocuous jokes about poo and butt sex as well.)
Inevitably, some will be offended by Cohen's play-bigotry, even if it is for comic effect. There is a famous joke about feminists-Q: How many feminists does it take to screw in a light bulb? A: That's not funny! The point is that the ability to laugh at oneself has always been one of the best indicators of self-awareness. When Borat interviews a group of speakers from Veteran Feminists of America, his questions so outrage the panel ("Is it not a problem that a woman have a smaller brain than a man?") that they storm off within a minute. What Cohen shows us is that unintentional self-parody is not limited to hicks and racists; these otherwise intelligent women are so wrapped up in their rhetoric that they fail to notice that the gawky man with the porno 'stache is joking.
This is the distance between Cohen's "Borat" and the work of such pundits as Michael Moore. While both filmmakers revel in their exposition of American absurdity, Moore's self-satisfaction is just as deluded as that of any of his subjects; by contrast, the fact that Cohen can sing songs like "Throw the Jew Down the Well," when he himself is Jewish, reveals a genuine confidence and sense of humor. When Cohen performs this number in a rural American bar, it is not the anti-Semitic lyrics which strike us, but rather the embarrassing fact that so many audience members begin singing along with sincere enthusiasm. In poking fun at bigotry, Cohen transcends it. Indeed, while the Anti-Defamation League and the Kazakh Foreign Ministry have voiced mild objections to Cohen's hijinks, it is a testament to the intelligence of "Borat" that the film is recognized by even the most raucously lampooned as a healthy dose of satire.
One of the film's most telling gags takes place when Borat meets with a humor consultant in order to acclimate himself to American sensibilities. At one point, Borat tells a story in which his sister teases a mentally retarded brother by exposing herself to him and jeering, "You will never get this! You will never get this! La la la la la!" The consultant, with palpable discomfort, replies that Americans would not find such a joke funny.
Of course, he is dead wrong.