Friday, November 17, 2006

Dopey

Having seen "Borat" and finding it for what it was "A COMEDY" about a fictional buffoon who either shows his buffoonery or brings out the buffoonery of others it is bizarre to have to explain its obvious premise.

Sasha Baron Cohen has stepped out of character to explain the obvious:

"Borat essentially works as a tool. By himself being anti-Semitic, he lets people lower their guard and expose their own prejudices, whether it's anti-Semitism or an acceptance of anti-Semitism. 'Throw the Jew Down the Well' was a very controversial sketch, and some members of the Jewish community thought it was actually going to encourage anti-Semitism.

"But to me it revealed something about that bar in Tuscon. And the question is: did it reveal that they were anti-Semitic? Perhaps. But maybe it just revealed that they were indifferent to anti-Semitism," he said.

Baron Cohen said the concept of "indifference towards anti-Semitism" had been informed by his study of the Holocaust while at Cambridge University, where he read history. "I remember, when I was in university, and there was this one major historian of the Third Reich, Ian Kershaw. And his quote was, 'The path to Auschwitz was paved with indifference.'

"I know it's not very funny being a comedian talking about the Holocaust, but I think it's an interesting idea that not everyone in Germany had to be a raving anti-Semite. They just had to be apathetic," he said.


And there you go.

When Borat stays at a 'Bed & Breakfast' owned by a Jewish couple it makes note that these sweet people's only problem is others ridiculous anti-semetism; when Borat talks to a rodeo guy about hanging gay people, the guy quickly goes along with the idea and it reveals him to be less to be a raving homophobe, than a person that would not lift a finger if such a thing became popular in society.

Within the comedy there is a lesson...

BUT MOSTLY THERE IS COMEDY.

Jeebus, it isn't that hard to figure out.

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