The adventures of Brüno, a contemporary descendant of Voltaire’s Candide, were conceived and implemented by Sacha Baron Cohen, who in his usual manner holds a humongous magnifying mirror up to the face of America in his new film – three years after the deafening success of his Borat. Tipping all the sacred cows of political correctness and wholeheartedly ignoring that condescending patronizing attitude toward “little people” (as Barbara Walters calls his victims), which prevents the mighty dogs of the American society to openly laugh at the less fortunate, the comedian extraordinaire ventures into all the forbidden territories with a skill of a mature navigator and the audacity of a naturally born genius. No stereotype is spared; no pompous respected societal institution is left untouched, and no poor provincial dimwit is turned away from his/her claim to a 15-minute fame. It is hard to pick the most surprising, outrageously funny moment in the film, just because it all consists of them, tightly packed one next to another. Two precious gay converting ministers in their self-revealing discussions with the deadpan Baron Cohen – always unflinchingly in character, always poignantly sincere (if one has no clue)... Stage parents, who are ready to subject a 30-pound 3-year-old to a liposuction if that’s the way to land her a part as a movie extra… Cute Paula Abdul sitting comfortably on a back of a live Mexican “piece of furniture” talking about her inherent ability to do good to people… During a Florida talk show, where Brüno is gushing about his trip to the “country called Africa” and populated by “African-Americans” he is genuinely surprised at the outrage his every word causes in the audience. His big brown eyes under perfectly bleached biased bangs are so full of frustration and disbelief at people’s reaction when he reveals that he traded his modern electronic device for a baby he calls “an African name, O.J.,” all the way tenderly holding his adopted child in his arms. Through the thickest layers of irony and sarcasm the actor manages to elicit sighs of compassion from the film viewers when narcissistic Brüno breaks up with his loyal sidekick, and little shrieks of shared pain when he is being whipped by some Ms. Vulgarity with grotesque implants and gross tattoos at some swingers’ party he penetrated in his search for the meaning of heterosexuality. Baron Cohen is a real virtuoso when it comes to playing the instrument of square-headed rigidity, pertinent to any righteous little town USA. However, in the LaLa land he exposes that same religiosity, narrow-mindedness and pervasive idiocy, only dressed in more expensive designers’ rags. Never in the mainstream, never all-loved or all excepted, often snobbed down and despised by the show biz establishment, and even more often threatened or slapped with lawsuits, the peerless entertainer once again entered the main stage of our cultural consciousness through the back door, reserved for the irreverent and therefore undeserving of reverence. So be it, the man is still a genius, and the funniest movie in years is [always] his. Directed by Larry Charles; written by Sacha Baron Cohen, Anthony Hines, Dan Mazer and Jeff Schaffer, based on a story by Baron Cohen, Peter Baynham, Hines and Mazer, and characters created by Baron Cohen; directors of photography, Anthony Hardwick and Wolfgang Held; edited by James Thomas and Scott M. Davids; music by Erran Baron Cohen; art directors, Denise Hudson and David Saenz de Maturana; produced by Sacha Baron Cohen, Jay Roach, Mazer and Monica Levinson; released by Universal Pictures. Sacha Baron Cohen (Brüno), Gustaf Hammarsten (Lutz), Clifford Banagale (Diesel), Chibundu Orukwowu and Chigozie Orukwowu (O. J.) and Josh Meyers (Kookus). Currently showing in Bay Area theatres.
0 comments:
Post a Comment