I never thought I would see the day where Borat was surpassed in crude humor. I've seen many, many comedies over the years
and most of them show a crude side but allow for some restraint. Bruno seems to be guided by this principle of...
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I never thought I would see the day where Borat was surpassed in crude humor. I've seen many, many comedies over the years
and most of them show a crude side but allow for some restraint. Bruno seems to be guided by this principle of "who cares
as long as it's funny" and throws not only caution to the wind but whatever hinders it's deepest, darkest impulses. There
are scenes where you wonder why someone was not killed (the Middle Eastern scenes), other scenes where you wonder why nobody
caught onto the joke and a few scenes that are very insightful and do the one thing Bruno sets out to do. That is, to expose
the bigotry, ignorances and hatred in our society to those who appear different.

Bruno is not the best film to have this kind of exposure to igorance nor is it really it's major focus. The main comedic
implement is still pranking real-life people and showing their reactions. It does it to many celebrities (the Paula Abdul
scene where Bruno shows her their chairs) and to ordinary people (the hotel staff called up to Bruno's room). I found there
were just enough scenes to allow the intelligent members of the audience to see where Cohen was going with this. But not too many of them to over-pound the point.

For example, you all have seen the talk show scene in the trailer with the all-black audience. But early on in that sketch
Bruno is simply talking to the audience with no explicit manneurism, no outlandish outfits and no comedic intent. When he
says that he is simply looking for "Mr. Right" as a single parent he is mercilessly boo'ed by the audience. What does that
say about how society? The booing is out of intolerance, hatred and ignorance which Bruno has not displayed. This juxtaposition of Bruno's absurdism and his subject's seriousness displays briefly before it's back to the pranking.

I liked Borat because it had more of that, it wasn't all pranking or catchphrases and had a deeply rooted layer of political
and cultural satire to it. Bruno has a layer of satire of pretension, selfishness and superficiality to all those around you. It doesn't surface as much because of the constant gags being pulled on ordinary people. While many of those are
hilarious, it's something missing from Borat that I found a tad disappointing.

Bruno doesn't even limited itself to homophobia and intolerance but drags out pretension and superficiality as well. The
one scene that really sealed this for me was Paula Abdul sitting on a Mexican person on all fours (the furniture didn't
arrive so Bruno had to pay Mexicans to be the chairs) talking about how humanitarian she is. Cut to the Mexican's face
who obviously understands what she's saying much like the audience is. It was little moments like that that I enjoyed more
than the constantly increasingly absurd gags.

I could go on and on about scenes and how Bruno uses them to their advantage. But I'll just leave it here and say that if
you know where Cohen is coming from it'll all make sense.

Bruno doesn't have a strong a narrative as Borat did, it doesn't have a focus and at times moves from gag to gag. While I
found many hilarious, what made Borat work was a framework to tie them together. Bruno comes to America to become famous
and that's really it. It's a bunch of gags one after another but without the roadtrip that helped Borat find focus as a
film. I'm going to warn everyone: this movie is the hardest R you will ever see. That previous sentence could be worked into a
Bruno joke.

3.5/5