'Borat Subsequent Moviefilm'

A Borat sequel in 2020 has no business working. None.

There’s the most obvious reason: the titular character’s main bit relied on unsuspecting, overly trusting rubes. After the smash success of the original film, it is unfathomable that anyone in America doesn’t know Sacha Baron Cohen’s iconic character. The film acknowledges this quite early on, and yet still manages to find a few marks.

There’s the less obvious reason: America in the age of Donald Trump and QAnon and so much else seems beyond the point of parody. This, as it turns out, is not quite true. Lampooning the absurdity of the moment is both necessary and, Cohen proves, still quite hilarious.

Finally, there is the fundamental reason: comedy sequels are almost uniformly terrible - typically a joke-topping rehash of the previous film that falls flat because doing the same jokes just bigger misses what made the original jokes funny in the first place - the element of surprise.

Going in reverse, Borat bucks the comedy sequel trend because of the nature of Cohen’s character. The joke is always the same: we Americans aren’t nearly as sophisticated or superior as we think. And the element of surprise is ever-present because of Cohen’s extreme commitment to the bit and his ability to find new marks.

America is not beyond the point of parody. Indeed, part of what this film shows is that there isn’t a point at which this will happen. Something can be absolutely terrifying and uproariously funny all at once. QAnon is precisely this. So is Rudy Giuliani. The threats they pose should be taken absolutely seriously, but that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be laughed at as well.

Finally, Cohen gets around an over-reliance on Borat by donning his own new set of disguises within disguises and, most importantly, by getting us all acquainted with Maria Bakalova. Bakalova plays his daughter and shows the same penchant as Cohen for sticking to the bit no matter how outrageous, whether that’s living in a cage, inviting Giuliani in to a hotel room for a seemingly lurid encounter, or doing a prolonged menses dance that you will not be able to forget.

Borat Subsequent Moviefilm can’t really hold a candle to its predecessor, but it is still extremely funny. I’m not sure I’ll laugh any harder at a film this year than I did during a few of the bits. Perhaps most oddly, this film might be the most culturally significant of the year, at least in the short-term. It made time for the sheer insanity of a global pandemic in a post-truth United States and, quite directly, making a mockery of a key political figure from a shameful and embarrassing era. It is not the best film of 2020 by a long shot, but it encapsulates this wretched year perfectly.