BRUNO: SACHA BARON COHEN RIDES AGAIN
July 3rd 2009 09:47
Triple strike: Sacha Baron Cohen returns as the fashionista, Bruno.
With the stunning success of Borat in 2006, it’s hard to believe that British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen could once again don some fake hair and fool people into blurting out their prejudices.
And that’s perhaps the biggest problem with Cohen’s new film, Brüno: there is so much here that’s like a pinpointed smart bomb to the funny bone that you can’t help but feel some of it is an elaborate set up. Still, there’s little time to consider such implications because Brüno, much like Borat before it, tears into its targets with a ferocity that is quite astonishing.
Cohen of course stars as Brüno, the delicately coiffed star of Euro TV fashion show, Funkyzeit. Brüno loves his life as a fashionista, and he shares his passions with his diminutive flight steward toy boy – their life together shown in a montage of truly indecorous proportions. But after crashing a runway presentation in his overly sticky all-Velcro suit, Brüno is ‘schwartzlisted’ from all fashion events and his glamour-tinged life seems all but over.
Still, this development frees up our hero to make his way to Los Angeles, where he plans on pursuing his dream to become ‘the biggest Austrian star since Hitler,’ launching a hilariously self-indulgent celebrity interview show.
And so we follow Cohen’s creation as he attempts to join the Hollywood A-list, the journey taking he and faithful assistant Lutz (Gustaf Hammarsten) through a dizzying succession of awkward vignettes – some blazingly successful, some not so.
Brüno going on a hunt with a trio of southern casual shooters is fantastic entertainment, featuring the greatest campfire-lit awkward silence in the history of cinema, as is his time spent at a blue-collar swingers party, which ends with the protagonist launching himself through a shuttered window.
Not so successful, however, is an interview with politician Ron Paul. Clearly not in on the joke, Cohen’s target-finding seems to be on the blink in this instance, as the libertarian-minded politician is played for a fool and reacts with unbridled venom. It’s moments like these that, although they’re certainly not scripted, take the shine off the rest of the film. Brüno is not as clearly or cleverly drawn a character as Borat, and not nearly as likable either.
Of course, laying the praise or blame solely at the feet of Cohen would be an error, because just like Borat, there’s a whole team involved in bringing this to the big screen. Cohen was joined by Anthony Hines, Dan Mazer and Jeff Schaffer in developing the screenplay and it’s clever stuff, with the setups - regardless of their taste - being much more acute than in Borat. Larry Charles returns to direct the film after his stellar work on Borat, and he too does an excellent job at getting the material the filmmakers needed, seeing as he no doubt had to play a character himself for a significant amount of time.
However, the film still wouldn’t have been possible without Cohen, the comedian’s superb timing and unmatched sangfroid being something that needs to be witnessed to be believed. There are times when you have to stop laughing simply because you fear his relentless dedication to character is going to put him in harm’s way.
These moments are rare, however, simply because Brüno is remarkably successful in its cleverly targeted mayhem, the laughs being bailed one on top of the other with such speed you barely have time to take a breath. There is the predictable lag at about the hour mark when the Cohen’s schtick gets a little tiresome and Brüno’s narcissism drifts towards the putrid, but it’s all blown away in a rousing final scene that is so cleverly worked, any questions of there being a setup seemingly cease to matter.
Brüno is released nationally in Australia on July 9.
Check out the trailer for Brüno below:
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Mountain Fog
Comment by The Rusty Can
Everything
Cohen's brand of humour makes me cringe. It's difficult to watch him provoke people the way he does, giving their prejudices a good old poke. And gosh he's shameless. I applaud his guts, but I'm too much of a sook to watch this one.
Rusty.
Comment by Matt Shea
20/20 Filmsight