Last night I wanted to go to the movies, even if unfortunately in August you take what is available. The only open-air theater in town ran Borat. I knew I wasn’t going to like it, but I thought I had to see in order to better criticize…
The plot of this movie is very simple. Borat is a Kazakh reporter. He lives in a poor village where ignorance, racism, sexism, prostitution and lack of hygiene are the standard. He is hired by local goverment to fly to the US and make a documentary about American customs and culture. There, he does lots of mistakes due to his cultural difference, creating embarrassing situations.
How this movie managed to get an Oscar nomination is beyond me. The way it denigrates Kazakhstan, expecially in the first 20 minutes, is outrageous. It does heavy use of stereotypes about poverty, ignorance, sex promiscuity, sexism, religion, attitude toward mental handicaps and everything else. It depicts Kazakh people as if they lived like animals and hated Jews and Christians. What tries to be humorous, ends up being sad.
In the second half the movie tries to criticize American culture by building an implicit parallel, showing neo-nazis, creationists, people with prejudices against homosexuals and prostitutes, sexist students, war supporters and so on. Unfortunately, the critique against US hypocrisy is way weaker than what was shown for Kazakhstan.
Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan
USA, 2006, by Larry Charles, Comedy
IMDB 443453
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I agree, definitely the most disappointing movie I’ve seen in the last year.
And by the way, if you make a little research you find the image of Kazakhstan drawn by the movie is total bullshit:
- Kazakhstan is a member NATO Euro-Atlantic Partnership Council,
- population is 44% Chistian Ortodox,
- GDP per capita is 22% of what the USA enjoys (which is not so bad and for example is close to Mexico’s),
- local economy is mostly based on services and industry.
References:
http://www.nato.int/pfp/eapc-cnt.htm
https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/kz.html
Even worse, they shot it using deceptive tactics, using people unaware of what was going on.
http://www.andrewtobias.com/newcolumns/061113.html
http://www.theagitator.com/archives/027227.php
