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The Top Story: Bruno is here!
In expectation of Sacha Baron Cohen's latest ambush comedy film, Brüno, arriving in theaters this weekend, discussion of Cohen's gay fashionista character — and whether the movie is likely to hurt or help gays — has heated up considerably. (Check out our take here.) We thought now a good time to see what some media had to say about the topic.
Out Magazine I read Mo Rocca's interview with Brüno for Out before I took a good look at the cover. Turns out the magazine overpromises with its headline asking "Can The Agent Provocateur Dodge The Knives?" The interview is pretty light, considering that most of the discussion gays are having about Brüno have focused on whether Brüno is cutting satire or a gay minstrel act. Simply giving Cohen a forum to play out gags from the film struck me as a little behind the curve, especially as the cover headline leaves the impression that the article will be a little more substantial.
Salon Generally, I wasn't looking at how Brüno was reviewed, but I was impressed at how David Rakoff's look at "Why Brüno is bad for the gays" explains how an extreme stereotype like Brüno could have worked to mock not only homophobia, but also heteronormative-minded gays willing to excuse homophobia directed at someone as flamboyant or "annoying" as Brüno.
Gawker I often have issues with Gawker but they were able to capture a double-standard nicely, thanks to a reader who spotted Brüno's nude GQ cover shelved with a card to cover up Cohen's nudity, right next to an uncovered Esquire featuring a nude Bar Rafaeli on the cover. Both covers are about equal in terms of skin, but one is deemed acceptable to be seen in public while the other needs to be covered up. If Brüno fails at satirizing homophobia as a movie, his GQ cover succeeded.
Newsweek Plenty of media outlets are looking at the way Brüno was staged and how fake much of the movie is, but when Newsweek's Sarah Ball took a look at the movie's infamous cage match scene, she kept an eye on the bigger picture. Before examining how the scene was manipulated, Ball looks at the lives of an openly gay couple living in Fort Smith, Arkansas, where the cage match scene was filmed. She opens the story by discussing the kind of harassment they endure at the hands of their fellow Arkansans. Looking at their story that way makes it even more infuriating that the movie was supposed to conclude with Brüno's boyfriend being "hilariously" depicted as permanently disabled after fans attending the match were so outraged they attacked the couple. The point being, these are this gay couple's neighbors and the people who make their lives miserable. Isn't that funny?
"That's Gay" It turns out Bryan Safi will be tackling Brüno in tonight's infoMania. Safi's media criticism is usually brilliant and this time he looks at the film as yet another case of Hollywood finding homophobia hilarious. Submitted by on Fri, 2009-07-10 09:10. |
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News, Reviews & Commentary on Gay and Bisexual Men in Entertainment and the Media
CurrentTV
I'm so glad people are finally taking notice of Current. I've been watching it for years. It's my "reality" TV. I abhor the other so-called reality junk on TV (except Top Chef :luv:).
As for Bruno - I won't see it; not my cup of tea. The question of the intent or how the movie will be interpreted by nongay audiences came home to me the other night, though. An ad for the movie came on while I was watching TV with a few friends. One turned to me and said, "I'm so glad you're not like other gay guys." What happened next was like a "Very Special Episode" as I talked candidly about stereotypes and their negative impacts.
I might see it...
i actually might see Bruno....as i said a while back, i think my annoyance was the over the top public appearances by SBC as his character....which he is still doing.
I'll wait a while for more reviews though. decisions, decisions......
The Michael Jackson connection
Apparently a scene featuring Latoya Jackson in which Bruno tries to get MJ's phone number has been dropped from the film because--are you holding onto something?--it might be offensive! At least have the courage of your convictions, Bruno! As it turns out, I will have to see the film, if only because parts of it were filmed in my back yard. With all the cuts, I could be in and out of the theatre in under an hour!
"The mountain has wings."
It is quite short
Saw Bruno yesterday
I wanted to see it a few
I wanted to see it a few months ago. I liked the Bruno character on Da Ali G Show, but I've gone way beyond the over-exposed mark. I'm so sick of hearing about Bruno, and seeing Bruno everywhere you look.
Maybe in a few months, once all the hype has died down, I'll watch.
"Open up your mind and then open up your heart. And you will see that you and me aren't very far apart." - Blessid Union of Souls
It's just not very funny -- and that's all there is to it.
You'll laugh and squirm with discomfort...
...this was not a pleasent movie experience for my partner and I. The movie does have some funny moments, you can't deny it. But it's painfully awkward at times...especially for a gay person. And it's not so much the movie as it is the reaction of the audience. Several times during the movie we heard things like...and these are actual quotes.."ewww, gay people are gross." "Typical fag". "Freaks". "Pervert". Really, all the typical things you'd hear yelled at gay people by homophobes.
I don't think the "humor" was lost on everybody though...I mean, I think a majority of the people watching the movie got it...but it's the minority of the viewers who were the most vocal..and in turn, the most depressing.
As for the character and the movie itself...I was not impressed.
Discomfort is the Point of Bruno
I'm sure it was unpleasant but I think that's the whole point of a character like Bruno.
It's like smoking out the homophobes hiding in plain site.
It has nothing to do with Bruno himself or who he is or isn't.
It is completely about the effect Bruno has on the other people in the film and in the audience.
Bruno didn't make the audience homophobic. They had to have that in them from the moment they got up that morning in order to have it roll so easily off their lips.
"That's our job today: to control the extent to which people can publicly manifest antigay sentiment." (Bayard Rustin) ** "Heterosexuality is not normal, it's just common" (Dorothy Parker)
saw the film last night
Borat also stereotyped
I think the height of "not getting it"
was when a friend went to a lecture on internet predators and the lecturer brought up the MySpace page of the kind of guy you should keep your kids from befriending online. My friend was cringing at this point, but waiting to see how bad it got (or maybe he was just rendered speechless by the stupidity of it all... finally someone yelled from the back of the room "That's Borat, he's a character from The Ali G Show!"
Great story!
Well, after "Another Gay Movie" 1 & 2...
The first one was enjoyably tongue-in-cheek (insert appropriate pun--and anything else--here), but the second one was borderline horrifying. Unlike "Bruno" it was actually made BY gay people, but I can't imagine "Bruno" being more offensive or wrongheaded to gays than that was. Egad.
Why Are We So Afraid of Bruno?
I won't even speak to how crazy fascinating I think SBC. Just from the promotion for the film I feel like you could do a complete course in REAL sensitivity training and Acceptance (as opposed to tolerance)
I think an excellent experiment would be to show Bruno to all straight audiences. Randomly chosen with the only criteria be that they are not gay, lesbian or bisexual.
Then video tape the audience responses when they are sure that there are no gays n the room.
Yeah it sounds very Tyra but that's what makes her "social eperiements" so unsettingly. After you're done laughing at how cheesy she is, you realize how horrible it feels to know that there are still children in the world (for instance) who think the only latina in town should be "the maid" based solely upon her ethnicity.
If we really want to know who we're living with, who's voting on our right to marry, who's deciding whether or not we get to adopt children , etc. I think Bruno is that kind of litmus test. Gays and Lesbians always seem so "shocked" when we don't just get treated equally on general principle or when some piece of legistlation denies us equal protection under the law because he like to shelter ourselves from the hate as much as possible.
Completely understandable but it also means we forget about it sometimes. We forget that sometimes homophobia comes in the body of a pretty blonde beauty queen who's just behaving he way she was "raised".
It is easy for most straight folks who aren't homphobes to accept that someone like NPH or Sarah Gilbert or Ellen Degeneres or Cheyenne Jackson could be "just like them" and thereore deserves equality.
But is it still easy for our fellow Americans to accept it with the "gay" in question embodies every joke, stereotype and anti-gay sentiment they've ever heard, thought or uttered? Do gays have to be talented, well-behaved, perfectly groomed, intelligent and pleasant to be around in order to be "accepted"?
I think gay folks are wrong in thinking Bruno has anything to do, at all, with actual gay men. It's not about gay men. It's about straight men, straight women, straight people. It's about hypocrisy and double-talk and fake tolerance.
Maybe it is too much to expect that we as gay people could completely disassociate ourselves from a character like Bruno but then that says something about our own level of comfort with ourselves, our sense of security about who we are in this country, in our towns in our circles of friends.
What I hear most underlying the disgust and hatred of the movie is Fear.
Fear that straight folks won't be able to tell the different between a cartoon character and real live people and that "Bruno" will have some kind of effect on the way straight people treat gays, lesbians and bisexuals.
Think about that? We're worried that a movie character will change the way people see and treat us in real life?
If we weren't worried, we wouldn't talk about Bruno so much and be so OTT about the publicity etc. I'll bet the fact that this fear exists isn't lost on SBC either. He seems like a very astute and observant guy.
The fact of the matter is, you don't ever have to have seen an actual gay man (I don't care how sheltered or religious, etc your life has been) to absolutely know for a fact that Bruno is a cartoon, a lampoon.
People are at their worst but often at their most honest when they are made to feel uncomfortable
I don't even think one needs to see the movie to get the point of it or to experience the effect of it, to see what it does to us as a culture.
The fact that we are actually worried that real live people will embrace the cartoon that is Bruno as authentic worries me a lot more than Bruno himself.
"That's our job today: to control the extent to which people can publicly manifest antigay sentiment." (Bayard Rustin) ** "Heterosexuality is not normal, it's just common" (Dorothy Parker)
Cultured, educated people
Cultured, educated people would never assume Bruno to be anything more than a spoof figure. However, it's not cultured, educated people who voted to approve prop 8 in CA or prop 2 in Florida, or the bans in any other state. Those people see Bruno and think it's an accurate portrayal. Heck, even one of my own friends thinks that's what "most gays" are like. A movie like this can affirm for them that "those queers" are perverts. If the movie was an effeminate man going about his business and maybe kissing a boy or two it wouldn't be a big deal. However, he goes out of his way to be offensive which reinforces the negative opinons people hold.
Would this movie be so funny if it was a supposedly Jewish man taking over the American financial system and trying to overcome his own insecurites about his inferior genetics? Oh yeah, audiences would eat that stuff up laughing over the obvious lampoon of stereo types.
Friends
"Heck, even one of my own friends thinks that's what "most gays" are like."
I don't get how that works. Have they met you? You clearly are not like Bruno and since you are one man and Bruno is one man, why does he "win" out as what they think about gay men?
So somehow Neil Patrick Harris (who is inescapable), the gays of Brothers and Sisters and Will and Grace and any number of other television representations of gay men has NO affect at all. Only Bruno registers as an authentic representation of a gay man?
If someone made a brilliant, funny satire about a "real" Jewish conspiracy to take over the finanacial system, yes, I would think it would hilarious and so would every one of my Jewish friends and family members.
Have you seen Mel Brooks movies?
I have no interested in pandering to ignorance or spending my time trying to get stupid people (of all class and educational background) to love me.
That should not be our goal. There will always be ignorant, racist homophobes. We can't wish them away or charm them into being less so.
The only thing we can do is to make our voice LOUDER and STRONGER than theirs and that is the thing that we as gay people never seem to get that many other civil rights movements understood.
People voted for Prop 8 because of religion, not because they think all gay men are like Bruno. You could be the nicest, most well-behaved gay in the village and folks who are homophobic will still think you shouldn't get to marry a man or raise children because you are gay.
Bruno is a fictional character so Prop 8 has no effect on him. Folks who voted for Prop 8 don't care what "kind" of gay someone is. It's the fact that the guy is gay. It's the same sex sex they care about. That's the sin. Not ystyle or lifestyle choices. Period. End of.
It hurts to think that we have to constantly struggle against bigotry but we do. This fight is not not about winning hearts and minds, it's about gaining political power and influcence and making ourselves visible and unavoidable.
I'm not a person who is easily offended and I live in a very diverse urban environment where gays are very vocal and very out so I know I have a biased view but it doesn't mean my view is less significant than folks who live in more isolated communities.
Any friend of mind who thought for even a second that BRUNO represented what gay men are really like simply would not be my friend and I wouldn't think twice about it. Done and done.
If we act like we are ashamed then people will treat us like we have something about which we should be ashamed.
"That's our job today: to control the extent to which people can publicly manifest antigay sentiment." (Bayard Rustin) ** "Heterosexuality is not normal, it's just common" (Dorothy Parker)
Bored Again
I, for one, am not afraid of Bruno, but, six months into the Brüno media blitz, I'm a bit bored by him. I feel as though I've already seen the movie ten times. "Borat" came as a bit of a surprise; I think I only slept through about ten minutes of it, and that's pretty good for an old guy. I will, reluctantly, go to see "Brüno," not because it has something improtant to say about homophobia (it doesn't), but because it trashes my home state. An archeological crew I worked with one summer forty years ago was rousted out of bed in the middle of the night by a band of good old boys and told to leave Clarksville, Arkansas. They didn't like our long hair and were afraid we were going to start a hippy colony. I'd like to think we've come a bit further than that in the forty years since that night. I want to see if I'm right.
By the way, if it's a matter of "not getting it"--what's not to get about being hit over the head with a sledge hammer? Maybe one good thing to come out of this will be that, rather than "gay," kids will start saying, "That's so Brüno!" I like Sacha Baron Cohen and wish him all the best in his career; I hope he makes a fortune off "Brüno"; but, please, if there's any justice in the world, don't let there be a sequel!
[This email was intended to be offensive. If you are offended, I have succeeded in my brief. Why do I want to offend you? because you are there and because I am smarter and funnier than you and because you deserve to be humiliated. Ridicule is the highest form of humor--especially when it is without purpose. You may now return to your regular programming.]
"The mountain has wings."
The Teenage Crowd
I was at the movie theatre earlier tonight and I watched a group of younger boys being ID'ed at the doors to Bruno. I think some and maybe most of the movie could potentially be hilarious stuff -- but I really don't think this character is good for the gay world in the slightest bit.
What struck me was that these 16/17 year old kids wanted to see this movie... and I hardly think that it was to see the way Sasha Baron Cohen was able to exploit homophobia in middle America. These kids wanted to watched a flamboyant gay man make ridiculous comments and make people feel uncomfortable.
They want to watch Bruno disgust people and then laugh at it -- I don't know much but it really gave me a really negative vibe. Kind of like "let's watch that gay guy do what gay guys do"....
I completely agree with you.
I saw it last night
It was funny, but ridicculous and unnecessary- just like Borat, the movie will be hilarious the first few times you watch it, but then come the 3rd or 4th time and it has lost its appeal. It was awkward seeing it with all my straight friends- but it IS just a comedy, and it IS all just actors. There isn't one actual gay person in that movie.
The penis-dancing video was so random and uncalled for LOL. Funny, but at the same time, I could do without.