Sacha Baron Cohen's "Bruno" is Still as Provocative and Messy 10 Years Later

Scene from Bruno (2009)

Nowadays it's difficult for audiences to get the appeal of someone like Sacha Baron Cohen. Following the lukewarm response to his 2018 series Who Is America, it seems like his days of being a renegade comedian are starting to dwindle, especially as the world around him has grown more absurd. However, those willing to remember him as the acclaimed genius behind Borat may find the trajectory a bit more bittersweet. His ability to take on wacky characters in order to unveil the political climate of the Bush era was praised for making the closeted opinions surface for some of the more bigoted facets of America. It also created a surreal blending of realism of the world around Cohen with the fiction of Borat's ongoing adventure to marry Pamela Anderson and become a genuine American. 

The film was so much of a juggernaut that beyond people quoting Borat extensively, it just became too annoying. Audiences knew Cohen the provocateur. How could he possibly continue to hide in plain sight, getting audiences to go along with his antagonism? 10 years ago, he found his last shot of glory with Bruno, directed once again by Larry Charles. This time he took on the fashionista Bruno and explored the world of gay treatment in America. While it was more confrontational and more divisive, it cemented him as a shameless talent who would do anything for a laugh. It mostly worked, even if time has unfortunately been less kind to the general public's willingness to mix reality and fiction. It's more challenging and controversial than Borat, but Bruno works at conveying homophobia in America. It's a lot messier and juvenile, but still pretty funny.

In some ways, the magic of Cohen always had a shelf life. In 2003, he gained fame for his series Da Ali G Show, which brought three wildly different characters to HBO to do faux-journalist pieces on the world. While Ali G was often the big draw as the gangster who got politicians and scientists to say ridiculous nonsense, the show also featured Kazhakstan's Borat and Austria's Bruno. The latter was a fashion journalist who also reveled in being flamboyant and thrusting the gay lifestyle on others. For a certain audience, it was uncomfortable because of the perception that gays had in culture. Others simply found Cohen's willingness to play into stereotypes to be regressive. It's likely why Bruno was the third character to get adapted to the big screen, which even then feels mostly like a chance to bank on Borat's unfathomable success. Considering that it helped launch Cohen to a more conventional film star status in the decade to come, it already created a trap. In a time when Brokeback Mountain received backlash for being a "gay cowboy" movie, why would anyone put up with a man who wore leopard-print monokinis and had too much of a seductive stare everywhere he went?

It was the novelty that would work on one hand. In every frame of Bruno, there's something that is meant to challenge the heteronormative. There's a ridiculous sex scene where someone appears to be spinning on a phallic device. In another Cohen is seen having oral sex with a member of Milli Vanilla from beyond the grave. There's so much that exists solely to be outrageous, and it's maybe the part of the film that's the easiest laugh but also the part that makes the film more dismissable. At another point, Cohen presents a pilot of a TV show where he interviews celebrities. The catch is that he pads time with creepy seductive dancing before a five-second interview with an unwilling Harrison Ford. At another point in the same test audience scene, he has a full frontal scene that ends in a rather bizarre way. All of this is done to test the comfort level of audiences, which raises the question: is this really exploring how Americans perceive homosexuality, or is this merely to prod them into seeing some weird stuff?

It's odd, but that's how Bruno connects to the first Da Ali G Show movie Ali G Indahouse, which was a conventional scripted film. It mostly existed in a world of broad humor and didn't push boundaries. It's true that Bruno being bold was itself a commentary, but considering that this was the real world, it made it seem like a stranger harassing people for no reason.

This is why Bruno probably gets a less positive reception. The acceptance of the film's moments, such as Bruno bleaching his butt, requires some acceptance that goes beyond whether someone is gay. Not all of the humor is like this, as Bruno is a celebrity-driven man who desperately wants to talk to stars like "Stevie Wunderbar." A lot of it is a play on his Austrian persona, mixing German dialect with American culture in a way that is meant to hit the same funnybone as Borat's "my wife." To say the least, it's not nearly as successful. As a source of humor, it's difficult to judge based on the broad strokes of things. Depending on your love of stylish outfits that look ridiculous on a well-groomed man, it's difficult to appreciate what this film does. Much like how Borat explored racism of the mid-Bush era, Bruno captured a time when gay marriage was still controversial in ways that were telling, but also more muddled thanks to the need for humor that doesn't always land.

However, it's when Cohen actually gets into the heart of things that Bruno becomes more of a masterpiece documenting those unaware that they're on candid camera. The film is very much of its time, including Bruno's desire to adopt a black baby that he got in a trade for an iPod. It's something reminiscent of the Angelina Jolie/Brad Pitt adoptions that made the news at the time, but it comes off more absurd when put in a Jerry Springer-esque setting where Bruno is confronted by a hostile audience. In fact, this is where Cohen works best. You can't believe that he's able to keep a straight face, knowing that he could be beaten up at any point. Then again, the film ends with the second-best use of Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On" as Bruno kisses a man passionately in a wrestling ring at a homophobic event. He barely misses getting smacked in the head by a chair, and it's surreal as it is funny. It's the perfect metaphor for Bruno as a film. It gets away with everything, but just barely.

There's an exploration of other themes that feel prescient, such as Bruno confronting gay conversion therapy, the military, and even a swingers group in which he convinces a man to show him how to do a reverse cowgirl (though not in a gay way). The journey of Bruno features Cohen trying to overcome his homosexual lifestyle, putting aside his vapid love of celebrity. However, it doesn't work. At every turn, he's wearing Dolce & Gabbana belts and quoting Sex and the City to campfires of people wishing to introduce the straight lifestyle to him. At the end of the day, it's funny because of how it explores the discomfort of straight people dealing with gay men but also ends by suggesting that being gay is something that cannot just go away. It's part of the identity. While Cohen is technically straight, it's still a solid way to end the film, even as it's done amid humor about being half his age and, in a cameo from Snoop Dogg, is called "the White Obama."

It's a self-indulgent farce that is put on top of the film's effective commentary. Cohen is able to stay in character in some of the most bizarre of situations, and the film is better for that. He even would tour around in character, putting on many of the lavish outfits and entertaining audiences. He would even dance on the desk of Conan O'Brien on The Tonight Show. Still, it wasn't as successful as Borat. It was also the point where people began to wonder how much longer Cohen could get away with things. While some could argue that Who Is America was an effective attempt at this, the love clearly isn't there anymore. He's been reduced to having to explore his pseudo-political themes in scripted fiction in films like The Dictator, which again are placed alongside juvenile gags. This isn't to say that Cohen has become irrelevant, but his days of provoking audiences may be behind him, in part because he is 47.

It's also hard because if Borat and Bruno have one unfortunate element, it's that they're a bit uncanny nowadays. The appeal was that Cohen mixed reality with his fiction. In an era where "fake news" has become a punchline, it's difficult enough to tell what is real anymore. The modern Borat and Bruno archetypes are figures with power, running governments and convincing audiences to believe something that is clearly a lie. Cohen tried to prove his relevance to the conversation, but Who Is America only came across as quaint and sometimes funny. It didn't say anything as provocative as it used to, in large part because the world is a much stranger place. There's no confidence in knowing what is real anymore. If anything, a shift back towards normalcy is much more desired than making a Borat 2.

Then again, it's hard to believe if Cohen would even want to take on such raucous performances nowadays because of Borat and Bruno. They were towering achievements in the mockumentary genre. However, they were also filled with lawsuits (and in one case death) that challenged him. As funny as they were, the modern era wouldn't allow for the harassment that Bruno got away with. It wouldn't be seen as funny, even if it was to prove that out-and-proud gays deserve just as much respect as straight audiences. In 2009, Bruno was more tolerable in that way. Now, it's easier to notice that it's a film with two sides. It's not a great comedy that is sometimes too much, but on the other, it's a perfect embodiment of how rampant homophobia remains in the American psyche. Things have gotten better, but Bruno is best viewed as a document from its time, whether as Cohen's attempt to keep his mockumentary style popular or for how culture has changed since then. It's imperfect, but nonetheless fascinating. These films don't come around often, so cherish them while you can.