By SAM WOSTEAR
BORAT the movie has been “great success” to quote the unapologetic Kazakhstan TV presenter. However, more and more of the people who appear in the film are speaking out against his creator, Sacha Baron Cohen. Some say they were tricked into thinking they were being interviewed for a Belarus documentary about American life. US contributors say they were paid as little as £70. Those in Kazakhstan allegedly got just £3 for being in the £27million smash. Here, they speak out.
NICU TUDORACHE
villager:
In the movie, Glod, a poverty-stricken village in Romania, is home to Borat and a community of male incestuous rapists and female prostitutes.It is presented as a typical Kazakhstan town.Just four of the 1,000 residents have a job, so they welcomed the £3 fee for appearing in the film. Grandfather Nicu has got together with some of the other villagers to pool funds in order to sue the film-makers. They believe they have been exploited and humiliated,Nicu lost an arm in an accident and in the film had a rubber sex toy attached instead. He claims he had no idea what it was and now feels ashamed and deeply disturbed by the incident.He said: “Our region is very poor, and everyone is trying hard to get out of this misery. It is outrageous to exploit people’s misfortune like this — to laugh at them. We will try to hire a lawyer to take legal action for being cheated and exploited.”Spirea Ciorobea was dubbed “village mechanic and abortionist.” He is furious with his portrayal.He said: “What I saw looks disgusting. Even if we are uneducated and poor, it is not fair that someone does this to us.” But vice-mayor Petre Buzea said: “They got paid so I’m sure they’re happy.”
FRATERNITY BOYS: The college kids,who wish to be known only as John Doe one and John Doe two, pick Borat up after he is left stranded on his mission to get to California to meet and marry Pamela Anderson. The boozed-up boys offer him a wide range of advice when it comes to courting the opposite sex. Since seeing the film, they claim they were duped into looking like boozy idiots. Now the frat boys are suing for fraud, breach of contract, invasion of privacy and distress. The pair want to have the scenes deleted — so catch the movie while you still can.
The road trippers show Borat the infamous sex video Pamela Anderson made with Tommy Lee.
DHARMA ARTHUR, TV producer: She lost her job as producer of the lunchtime news show on the WAPT network in Jackson, Mississippi.
She unwittingly booked Borat to appear on the show — and he disrupted the broadcast.
Anchorman Brad McMullan was struggling to control the Kazak guest, who insisted on standing up throughout the interview and attempted to walk out midway through as he needed to use the toilet.
The interview went from bad to worse when he made a string of sexual references, repeatedly kissed McMullan, in line with the traditional Kazakhstan greeting, before intruding on a live weather forecast, leaving weatherman Ken Johnson in hysterics, unable to finish the report.
Dharma now plans to sue. She said: “Because of him my boss lost faith in my abilities and second-guessed everything I did thereafter.
“I spiralled into depression and before I could recover I was released from my contract early.
“It took me three months to find another job and now I’m thousands of dollars in debt and struggling to keep my house.
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| Good Glod … Romanian village, left, and outraged Nicu |
“How upsetting that a man who leaves so much harm in his path is lauded as a comic genius. Think of all the other people who’ve probably been fired because of his antics.”
BOBBY ROWE, rodeo manager: Lulled into a sense of false security, the man from Tennessee appears as the face of redneck America and is outspoken about Iraq, homosexuals and Muslims.
The crowd at the rodeo provide enough ammunition to fill a full 90 minutes — one cowboy goes so far as to recommend Borat shave off his moustache or risk the terrible fate of being mistaken for a Muslim.
Borat takes centre stage before the rodeo begins and addresses the packed stadium, offering his nation’s support for Bush’s War On Terror.
The audience noisily lends its approval with cheers and applause even when Borat calls for Iraq to be bombed “so only lizard survive.”
His popularity comes to an abrupt end when he bursts into song — reciting the Kazak national anthem to the tune of the Star Spangled Banner.
The anthem declares that all other countries are run by little girls and Kazakhstan boasts the area’s cleanest prostitutes, with the exception of Turkestan.
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| Funny side … with humour coach Pat, and behind the wheel with Michael |
Bobby is keen to avoid the public glare. He said: “I got into the mess by someone calling me and telling me who they was and they weren’t.
“So now I don’t do any interviews over the phone any more.
“This phone rings ten or 12 times a day. That’s what got me into this mess and I don’t want to get in any deeper.”
MICHAEL PSENICSKA, driving instructor: He believes his life was put at risk after Borat drove on the wrong side of the road.
Michael, of Baltimore County, Maryland, says he got a call from a foreign TV company saying they were making a documentary film.
He claims that, as he was signing a release form agreeing to his participation, the producers flashed cash in front of him.
Michael said: “I saw 500 dollars and signed it. I thought nothing about it but I was allowing them to make a documentary.
“I don’t care what I signed. I know what they did to me and it’s just not fair. Borat has not heard the end of me.”
JIM SELL, car salesman: He was approached by the producers of the film at his Chevrolet car dealership in Gaithersburg, Maryland, and asked to take part in the film.
Sell claims the film crew had already begun filming when he was handed 150 dollars.
In the film the car dealer appears to sell the reporter an ice cream van after advising Borat which car is most suitable for killing a family of gipsies.
Jim claims his reputation has been ruined as a result, as he cannot sell second-hand vans.
JOE BEHAR, bed and breakfast owner: He and his wife say a scene showing cockroaches running around at their home has hurt their business in Massachusetts.
Borat is seen throwing money at the cockroaches, claiming the Jewish couple have used their evil to “change shapes” and become insects, before fleeing the elderly couple’s home.
Joe claims they were told the film was being made for the Kazakhstan Tourism Department. The cockroaches were added digitally by film-makers.
Joe said: “This is very insulting. They never told us they were going to do this. It is really terrible.”
PAT HAGGERTY, speech and humour coach: Not everyone is annoyed with their part in the film. The Washington DC public-speaking expert claims he realised Borat was a spoof character during the interview and is happy to have the free publicity his 15 minutes of fame has brought.
Pat said: “About halfway through the session we took a break and I went up to one of the producer guys and said, ‘This guy can’t be real.’
“If you let me in on the gag, I will help you reach your goals because I don’t care if you are from Kazakhstan. Nobody is this crazy.
“But I soldiered on and figured they paid me my money and they deserve an hour of my time and I’m going to be as professional as I can.”
Throughout the tutorial Borat introduced Pat to popular Kazak jokes, including one about having sex with your mother-in-law.
Borat’s “retard” brother is also a figure of fun and he explains how he is kept in a cage to control his “craziness.”
Pat, who has not yet seen the film, added: “To the best of my memory I don’t believe I said anything stupid.
“However, I’m in the movie. The only downside I see is if I appear to be a fool.”
– – –
editors note by zum:
whateverrrrrr, lol , i thought the movie was hilarious. i watched it on the day of release. the movie theater was packed, and everyone was laughing their asses off, incl me… i cried tears of laughter at some of Borat’s antics.
some people don’t seem to know that Sacha Baron Cohen, is a jew himself. he just shows how america really is. which i can contest ( specially about the southern part ), because i am a foreigner in this country and what some of these rednecks say on the flic – that’s how it truly is. a pretty much racist country.
Zum 
I think you mean to say you can “attest” to the fact Sacha Baron Cohen is showing how America really is. Puhlease, the whole POINT is that this is not REALLY a “documentary” and therefore not representative of the country as a whole, and you know it – or you SHOULD, anyway. Let’s assume this country IS racist (a mind-set whose victim mentality gets you nowhere by the way); why didn’t you mention having a problem with the comments regarding homosexuals or women? Does it not serve your purposes?
michelle,
foremost, i have not written the article ( you may want to look at the source on the top ). however, i commented on the bottom of the article. and yes, america is a racist county. maybe not in the eyes of a caucasian, because they have never experienced any real pressures as these so called ‘ minority’s’ do.
sacha cohen is a british comedian with a in your face attitude. i’ve happend to meet him here last year for a nascar movie he shot with will ferell and john c reily. he is a nice guy but also very very jewish and proud of it.
regarding the women and homosexual comments, i look at it from a wider perspective and found it hillarious.
i am woman ENOUGH, to look beyond the sarcasm.
Don’t forget that Romanian citizens have the right to work and live in the UK. They are free to move to other parts of Romania, or any part of the UK. They live in this village by choice. But with these weak business skills, they no wonder, remain poor people, no matter where they go.
I’d like to see you set up a business in Romania.
your comment implies that their lack of business skills is an inherent quality, not one born from rampant poverty, socio-economic inequality and a system that bars any class mobility. your comment shows that you are without a doubt lacking any real sociopolitical consciousness. congratulations, you fool.
This article is more exemplary of America than any Borat film every will be: sue, sue, sue. If someone stubs a toe or has a single eyelash insulted, it’s time to seek legal counsel and tenfold revenge. Nobody in their right mind would watch “Borat” and take it seriously — so why not get out of courtrooms and get a life?
it depends on the information the participants were given considering the film. the racists, homophobes, misogynists, producers, etc. can go jump in a lake, but if the romanians were lied to purely to be exploited, their mistake wasnt a problem of being honest, it was a problem of being lied to and used. they should have been paid more because many people in america are not in their right mind – as the movie shows. many people in america will see the movie and develop an idea of romania, kazakhstan or wherever that is informed in large part by the movie purely because americans are on a whole too stupid to differentiate fiction from reality. thats part of the meta-drama and irony of the movie. americans are too stupid to realize even their own stupidity they show in the movie.
were american and we are racist who cares
im willing to bet you and your “special friend” drake have not been subject to the oppression and violence of racism. a lot of people care because racism causes a great many people untold hardships that have ruined generations of peoples. i think revealing these social contradictions and their effects was part of the point of the movie. also, to show the irony of america and american sociopolitical consciousness and the willful ignorance that perpetuates this violence by people like you. im trying to say youre an idiot. sorry for the big words; i didnt mean to confuse you.
Some people react to what is seen in a film, and take it to a point where the hole thing becomes literal — and some of it probably is, to a certain extent (talking about the Rodeo Manager, as I don’t think someone would say something that serious unless they were put under intense pressure and he certainly didn’t seem like he was at all.)
But the reality is that, its basically they’re fault for instead of just walking away silently instead of noticing how weird someone was acting with a producer & video cam crew following them around./ So I attest, bothering the fetal courts with legal matters that are non-crucial matters instead of serious situations like murder, child pornography rings, etc are just a way restore they’re stupid mistakes and they’re half of the money out of the film’s earnings — with notable exceptions to the villagers :P
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I didn’t think most of the movie was funny. I didn’t mind when Cohen showed the racism at the rodeo or the frat boys. But some things he took too far. I didn’t know at the time that Pamela Anderson was in on the joke, and it seemed like an outright assault. In other instances, Cohen did things that no foreigner would ever think of doing, such as handing his shit to a dinner guest and running naked through a hotel. I didn’t think it was funny when he broke the antiques in the store. It is perfectly acceptable to me to expose people’s racism and other undesirable behavior, but in doing so, Cohen should not have stooped to being mean-spirited himself. It’s not okay to violate people’s trust if they are truly being nice (as a few of the people were; such as the TV station), not saying racist comments, and trying their best to open up to someone who isn’t acting like a foreigner, but acting like an asshole. The people who were racist jerks did themselves in without any help from Cohen. But for him to be abusive and mean-spirited, which he was … why would you go into someone’s guest home in Massachusetts with an elderly couple and ruin their business? Sorry, but that just isn’t funny. Fucking with people’s lives isn’t funny. The frat boys and the rodeo and redneck idiots got what was coming to them, but some other people did not deserve Borat’s version of “humor.” After the assault on Pamela Anderson, which I did not know was planned in advance, that completely turned me off to the movie, as I felt he had gone too far. Even though it was planned, it shows totally inappropriate behavior. People can argue that he was showing what not to do, but I disagree. Borat was a shit movie, and I won’t see it again. I’m all for breaking down racial barriers, and showing racists and chauvanists and creeps for who they are, but he should have not made fun of an entire village of people who did not know they were being duped.
he wasnt showing ‘what not to do,’ he was playing a character. that changes the whole verisimilitude. his character is inappropriate, rude, misogynistic and brutish. in essence, he was not sacha baron cohen playing borat – he was borat as he was viewed as borat by everyone (except the insiders) involved. the villagers should have been paid more, but they knew they were doing a movie, and once you sign on, youre binding yourself to the conditions and terms of the movie. whether what he did was right or wrong is another (arguably irrelevant) question because were not talking about cohen, were talking about borat, and when it comes down to it, youre judging the movie from a moral paradigm that is not applicable to the movie as its basis is in cohen the man, not borat the character.
stupid jew!
I never visited USA. Although the cultural differences between all countries are huge, you can never claim that if two persons are racists, that the nation is overall racist! This is stupid! You can find this kind of people everywhere in the world and much much worse! Good as well as bad people exist everywhere in the world!
Now the movie is toatally disgusting. I don’t deny that I laughed but I still believe it’s humiliating and the creator deserves punishment for what he did. Being funny or making a movie which can cause people to laugh is not at all enough alibi to be free to make such a movie where you are scamming people into participating without knowing what they are doing! He must be ashamed.
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