Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan

Fair warning, there are spoilers ahead. Not that these spoilers carry the same weight as telling you what the twist is at the end of the next M. Night Shamalyan movie that you totally couldn’t see coming, but I will give away bits of the movie nonetheless.

First thing first. You must see this movie.

Sacha (and yes, I will take the liberty of calling Mr. Baron Cohen by his given name) continues to do a great job at what he does so wonderfully. Making us cringe and laugh in the same breath at the wonder, folly and embarrassment of the human condition. And at rednecks.

One might say that this movie is offensive to people who live in Borat’s area of the world. As Borat walks us through his town, we see the village rapist and watch Borat make out with his sister who is also the “number four” prostitute in the village. The town is dilapidated and poor and Borat couldn’t be more proud of his roots.

But the thing is, we know this is a joke. We know that no matter where you go in the world, a man educated enough to produce a documentary would not be proud to stick his tongue into his sibling. We know that no town is proud of their local rapists. We know that while people may mix up English verb tenses in other countries, at least they have the respect to learn another language in the first place.

We are not really shocked until Borat comes to America and we see parts of our heartland for what it is.

For those of you who follow the show, it will come as no surprise that Borat makes people very uncomfortable and it’s effing hilarious when he does it. For those of you who don’t follow his show, stop reading this blog and rent Da Ali G Show immediately, watch it, then pick up where you left off.

But this blog isn’t about how great Sacha Baron Cohen’s acting skills are, it’s about minority representation in TV and film.

What Sacha is great at as a performer, is getting people to be frightfully honest. Most of the time this scares us because that honesty leads them to gleefully shout phrases like “throw the Jew down the well” and tell a cameraman that they want to hang all the gays from gallows.

Most of the time, the honesty we see from Baron Cohen’s show is great because it’s nothing like us. It’s a reflection on other people in other places who are stuck in some other time. But there’s a great moment in Borat that forces us to realize we’re not all that different. Maybe we don’t say things out loud in front of strangers, but the nastiness is inside of us nonetheless.

About 30 minutes into the movie, Borat and his producer are on the road to California and they drive through Atlanta. We see a close up of a sign reading “Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd.” And there is an audible “oh shit” from the audience.

We’ve all heard the comedic bit about how MLK streets are always in the worst neighborhoods. Dangerous places that Dr. King tried to prevent from taking root. And from what we know of Borat, we’re pretty sure that he’s about to get his ass capped.

And that includes me. A woman of color who tries to avoid selling out my own people. But even my hackles were up and I was afraid for Sacha.

Borat and his producer drive up next to three or four black guys playing craps on the street. He, very much unafraid, gets out of the car and engages the young men who clearly have no idea what to make of this man.

And they turn out to be the nicest people in the movie.

Sure they’re casually dressed and definitely speak in what has been affectionately termed “African American English.” But they’re really nice guys who take Borat in for the few minutes he allows them. They treat him nicely and try to help him out in the ways that he asks. They don’t threaten him, they aren’t shown talking crap about him behind his back. They don’t make scary ass political statements about immigrants or gays. They’re just cool guys who want to help their new friend have some fun.

We all knew what we were expecting. A few scenes later, Borat gets booed out of a rodeo by frightening and nationalistic Texans. Most likely, everyone on the theater thought the same would happen with these black guys, but maybe with a glock and the shouting of the n-word. But it didn’t.

For the first time in a while, the black folks weren’t the scariest people in a movie, but they were still sincere and interesting characters. They weren’t squeaky-clean boys, but they weren’t hard-core thugs out for blood. They were just guys trying to live in the same country as the white folks at the rodeo who cheered when Borat said “And may George W. Bush drink the blood of every man, woman and child in Iraq!

God bless you SBC. And God bless America.