I have really come to loathe the naval gazing disection of pop culture by a certain strain of liberal "intellectuals" who aren't smart enough to analyze actual literature or art, and certainly aren't smart enough to do the heavy lifting of intellectual work in science or math, but for whom it is deeply important to try to sound smart. Stephen Colbert's shtick is ostensibly aimed at conservative media types, but really it's much broader, making fun of everyone (like this critic) for whom it is more important to sound smart than to actually be smart.

Wow, dude, smart-sounding post you got there. ;-)

Having been dragged, kicking and screaming, to the Borat movie, I have absolutely no desire to see this film. I am an openly gay man, a bit on the sissy side, and I think the whole analysis was overdone. I think gay sissies are still a part of main-stream media. Jack from Will and Grace was hardly macho, but he was a good comic take on a gay person. Will was a bit closeted for my tastes, but then he was played by a straight actor. Both are gay people I know. I don't want to see this movie, not because of it caricature of gay people -- I know real people who make Bruno look understated and normal -- but because the movie sounds absolutely dreadful and a total bore, if Borat is any guide. As the heading well stated, "It's… a stupid movie." Why spend money to see something stupid?

I rather liked the Gay Decievers, btw, and let's not forget the all time winner for gay self-hatred, Boys in the Band.

Thank you, here2help. I thought it was just me.

How about for Cohen's next movie, he throws himself into the role of a humble rural worker who gets all these pretentious "elites" to show themselves as the assholes they are. He would lose his current fan base, but think of how many more he might attract.

What's wrong with this article? I thought it was funny. alabama IS the gayest state in America, how else could they have so many Amerian Idol winners? In the first box set of De Ali G (this might be the same episode referenced here), there's a great Bruno bit where he's actually in a college football locker room, asking one of the stars if he 'had any special message to all your gay fans out there' and so forth. [the answer--given more than once, and in perfect deadpan, "no...I'm not gay." Very amusing, I'll tell you what. Of course I want to see this new movie, and fully expect it to include some satire on the fashion world. Would I be offended with some off-color jokes? You know, I don't believe I would. Waiter: more please. My only regret is that Cohen will never be able to make a de Ali G movie--since that was actually my favorite of his characters.

Perhaps these reviewers do 'naval gazing dissections' of pop culture because that's what the public wants to read. When most people's media diet has become as unhealthy as their actual diet (Jon&Kate is the McDonald's of the soul), movies like Borat & Bruno start to seem like high culture by comparison. But who even decides what's actual art these days? Last time I visited my local contemporary art museum, what I saw was every bit as shocking and offensive as Borat. What makes a handmade ceramic toilet complete handmade ceramic shit 'actual art' while Cohen's work is not? Same goes for literature: the last contemporary novel I picked up featured an insestuous sadomasochistic relationship between a brother and sister. I didn't go looking for this type of thing, the cover featured an innocent looking stack of books, but that seems to be the type of thing that is found in many if not most contemporary works of fiction. We have all become jaded, and authors seem willing to pour on a lot more spice than Dickens or Proust ever resorted to. It seems like what you mean by 'actual art' and 'actual literature' are old art and old literature, from the good old non-lurid days.

Also, you hold up science as intellectually more heavyweight than criticism. I'm an organic chemistry grad student; I've talked with a lot of scientists. Sure, most scientists are very smart when it comes to science. Not so much when it comes to culture. The majority of scientists I've met would probably say that it's just snobbery to think that Dostoevsky's novels are better than the Final Fantesy games (assuming they've even heard of Dostoevsky).

I'll take Jon and Kate over Dr. Phil, Lisa. BTW, you're an, uh, organic chemistry grad student, right? you, uh, got any pix, with glasses, unbuttoning your lab coat, maybe? mmm, smart girls. I would declare you art, I'll tell you what.

ASlyJD:

How about for Cohen's next movie, he throws himself into the role of a humble rural worker who gets all these pretentious "elites" to show themselves as the assholes they are. He would lose his current fan base, but think of how many more he might attract.

i dunno...i never saw but parts of borat, and bruno on the ali g show, which was funny...but i was actually struck by how very very hard the average person tried to not be an ass to borat, no matter how crazy or boorish he behaved...and i remember reading some "fancy pants" critic who said the same, something to the effect of that what borat proved was how polite most americans actually are, particularly when dealing with some complete rube from somewhere else.

Yeah, but it was still better than "Friends" and "Family Guy". I've never been able to make it through a full episode of those shows.

He did make an Ali G movie, before he got the American version of his show. It's all scripted, and not as funny as the show IMHO, but it's still decent.

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well, thanks very much, Liberty for all, I had no idea! I'm behind on these things. Once a friend of mine made a joke about a girl with a camel toe, and I thought she was insulting her foot care. About 2 years later, oh.... Just yesterday, I figured out what the Japanese acronyms gravura and AV-idol (or AV-star) meant. and people make fun of wikipedia. Not I, I'll tell you what. Thanks again, Liberty. I'll defintely have to buy the de Ali G movie. You know, like "Borat" the film not being as good as the bits from the show, Martin Short's "Jiminy Glick" show was much better than HIS movie, too, but it's still nice to have. "Simpsons" film? Same thing.

I don't think the movie is all that funny, or that Cohen's act is, in general. Other articles have nailed the fact that what Cohen is all about is the taming presence of the camera. What would improve the shit out of Cohen's act would be for him to explore the limits of that control, and he doesn't do that. Phil Donohue takes more real chances, and that's a fact.

Brüno is not about gay men, funno or otherwise. It's about GAY PANIC. As long as gay panic is a credible legal defense

(see, <link>

when, for instance, the cops beat someone to death while rousting a gay bar, then I would have to say gay panic is fair game. But SBC doesn't take the chance that one of his targets might turn on him. It's very much a tour of the zoo, not the jungle.

Where the Slate article goes wrong is by missing this, and missing the fact that straight male gay panic is the actual topic of nearly every gay reference in American pop culture, and for sure every funny one.

about Bruno.

Then again perhaps UK TV, if a true reflection of UK culture (big claim, perhaps not warranted) indicates that the UK is in a different place to the USA (Which is why "Bruno" gets more mileage in the USA than he does in the UK).

Leaving aside the deliberately OTT in your face fake gayness of Sasha Baron Cohen, we also have the genuine OTT in your face gay comedy of Graham Norton, Alan Carr & Julian Clarey. All of whom have or have had mainstream British TV chat shows, admittedly late at night.

Less OTT but still with a waspish tongue, Paul O Grady has a early evening slot on British mainstream TV which links nicely to the British soaps liek Coronation street that has gay characters as real characters and not merely excuses to hang a plot line on.

What is noticable, especially with the Graham Norton show, is that when the chat shows have American guests, although there are a few who clearly do not get the joke, most do and not only are they comfortable with the humour but join in with (ahem) gay abandon. It's almost as if they revel in the chance to push a few boundries.

Don't forget that "Queer as Folk" began on British television (I still love those episodes, as I saw them before the Showtime version).