What you need to know: In the same style as Borat, Bruno is a scripted story meshed with documentary. Sacha Baron Cohen plays Bruno, and Gustaf Hammarsten plays Lutz, his assistant and love interest. Every other person in the movie is real, and believes these characters are real and the subject of a documentary. The films main objective, aside from the comedy and scripted story, is to show; 1.) the vacuousness of the entertainment industry. 2.) That Americans are uneducated about other countries 3.) That the US is deeply homophobic, ignorant and bias towards gays.
Does Bruno accomplish this goal and what exactly does the film say about the American public and American culture?
Firstly, we must make a distinction between the 100% scripted scenes and the improvised/documentary scenes.
In these scenes Baron Cohen and Hammarsten play their characters whilst interacting with the general public. The film starts in the world of European fashion, and this is probably the only place where Bruno does not encounter blatant homophobia.
Once in the States, on Bruno’s quest for fame, he attempts to seduce former presidential candidate, Ron Paul. (so they can make a sex tape.) A consistent thread throughout the film is the fact that the sort of, sexual openness the character of Bruno possesses, makes people extremely uncomfortable. His tight clothing, conventionally attractive hairstyle and body, his bubbly, friendly and flirty demeanour, all make the men he encounters in America visibly uncomfortable. Paul is no different, he stiffly avoids making conversation with Bruno. Rather then politely reject his advances, he refuses to speak to or look at Bruno.
Sensing the awkwardness, Baron Cohen of course amps it up, ultimately dropping his pants down to his underwear. Ron Paul (understandably) leaves the room and storms off from the interview, but not before shouting to his handlers that the interviewer is “queer as hell!”
In a far scarier example, in an alternate take from the talk show scene, the host asks the audience;
“What would you do if Bruno asked you out on a date?”
To which an audience member replies “I’d introduce him to my friends Smith and Wesson”
Keep in mind Baron Cohen has not done anything to intentionally provoke at this time. He has simply introduced himself as a gay single parent from Austria. Richard Bey then asked the audience to raise their hands if they agreed, if they would shoot Bruno for asking them out, to which a good 90% of the audience raised their hands in agreement.
Sacha Baron Cohen has stated that in general, people were much more hostile and standoffish towards Bruno. Where as when filming Borat, people were very willing to help and were incredibly patient with him for the most part. Essentially, the characters are very similar. Both films tell a fish-out-of-water story about a foreigner in America. The main difference of course is that Bruno is gay. There are other differences as well that play into it though, like the fact that Borat is ugly and cluelessly stumbles through life, where as Bruno is conventionally attractive and acts with purpose. Baron Cohen stated “Borat never elicited violence, but with Bruno it’s peoples first instinct.”
Both characters originated on “Da Ali G Show” a British show starring Baron Cohen as Ali G, Borat and Bruno. The main shtick was basically that he would interview people while pretending to be one of three of these outlandish reporter characters. There is a Borat bit on this show where he tells a professional horse trainer that in his country they say “A horse is like a man.” He goes on for about five solid minutes, listing examples of how “When a horse sleeps, it is like when a man sleeps, when a horse walks it is like when a man walks.” She nods her head politely and lets him continue the entire time, not once interrupting or telling him she has to go. In another bit Borat is in a grocery store. He points to a package of cheese and asks the employee what it is, to which he replies “cheese.” He goes on to point and ask about every package of cheese in the freezer. Every time the employee answers him. Again, he allows him to continue for as long as he likes.
Reactions to Bruno were very different. One episode we find him at a gun show in the American south. His interviewee begins to talk about how wonderful America is due to it’s freedom. Bruno comments that to him, freedom is being able to walk down the street with his boyfriend without being harassed. The man changes his expression to a sour one and aggressively warns Bruno not to “bring that shit around [his] kids.” In another bit Bruno interviews a college wrestling team. The team is very happy to show him some moves, horse around with him and everything else. To finish up the interview Bruno asks that they give a message to the Austrian gay community. As you can probably guess, the young men immediately turn on him, throwing slurs his way.
Back to the film, on yet another stab at celebrity, Bruno decides to adopt an African baby.
For this scene, Baron Cohen and the director recruit the help of retired talk show host Richard Bey. They gather a real local audience and set up an elaborate fake talk show taping, with “more believable” guests featured before Bruno does his bit. Armed with badly photoshopped pictures and a baby T-shirt reading “gayby”, Baron Cohen is ready to pull his prank. He intended to poke fun at bad parenting by celebrities, but the reaction of the audience members to Bruno and his child are quite interesting.
Introduced as a single parent, Bruno steps out on to the set and is met with immediate applause from the audience.
Some of the men give him a judgemental glare because of the way he is dressed, but other then that, they seem to like him. They respond well at first…
Bruno: “It is like, really difficult bringing up a child without another parent. Am I right?”
the audience agrees.
Bruno: “I’m hoping that I don’t grow old alone, am I right?”
the audience agrees.
Bruno: “I’m hoping that I find Mr. Right. Am I…
Before he can even finish, he is met with boo’s and discourse. The audience immediately turns on him. One woman even standing up and telling him that he needs to get it together and is “lost and confused.” He responds with a bad joke about being able to get any guy in the room, and is met with even more booing and thumbs down.
Bey then asks Bruno to go and get his son, which he does. As soon as the audience see’s the baby, they gasp, boo, even a few shouts of “no!” can be heard. Before they know anything about the type of parent Bruno is at all, they pre judge him and immediately hate that he has this child. I can only assume because the child is black and Bruno is white (or maybe because Bruno is gay? I honestly don’t know why the audience is so shocked and horrified by the sight of this baby.) A male audience member demands to know where he got the baby and if the baby is “from Australia.” (Bruno has previously stated being from Austria.) They immediately presume he is a bad parent. They absolutely hate him at this point, and he hasn’t even done anything yet. Also, I just want to point out how happy and comfortable this child is with Bruno/Sacha Baron Cohen.
What reason do they have at this point to assume that this healthy looking, happy, well behaved baby is being abused?
Finally, the audience is given something to be understandably horrified at. Bruno tells them that he swapped the baby with his mother for a limited edition iPod, and that he chose to name the child “OJ”.
With the audience really riled up, he is ready to showcase his series of incredibly obviously photoshopped pictures. For example; this clearly fake image.
I mean, the outline around the kid is so intentionally badly integrated. Yet, they do not question it. They believe it 100% because they think this is the type of thing a gay parent would do. It confirms the beliefs they already hold, that gay men are unfit parents. They’re irresponsible, they have no parental instincts. The next image is even worse, and even more fake looking, with one of these men holding up a pair of swim trunks, and the owner of said shorts’ ass. Again, they fall for it because it confirms their belief that gays are perverted, and likely to be sexually inappropriate around children. This is why they don’t question what is so obviously not real.
Though I do have to give credit to this woman who was laughing her ass off the entire time.
The baby is then taken away in narrative, causing Bruno to attempt suicide by overloading on carbs (or carbicide). Lutz finds him hours later and the two characters develop some more chemistry, eventually leading to some sex at their hotel.
The next morning the two find themselves handcuffed together and unable to reach the key so they call the front desk for help. A man comes up and flat out refuses to help them.
Bruno: “Can you…? I think the key is over there.”
Hotel Staff: “Yeah, I can’t do this.”
He leaves the room and calls security, declaring himself “pretty freaking flipping” over the situation. Security comes up and Bruno again asks to be unlocked, and hotel staff again refuses. He tries to talk to the other man who came up, but he immediately says “don’t talk to me.”
I mean, it’s an awkward situation for sure, and one nobody should ever have to deal with, but are you really telling me that a straight couple in the same situation would be met with such hostility? That staff would flat out refuse to unlock them and then call the police? Yes, they actually called the police over this. What should have happened is hotel staff should have got the key off the dresser, unlocked the two men, charged them for the mess they made of the room and discontinued their stay due to hotel violations. Instead, they refused to help and called the police on them.
Baron Cohen and Hammarsten, still handcuffed together, wander around several more places asking for help. Nobody does of course. In a deleted scene they ask a cop at the mall for help, and he screams at them to get out. Again, I find it hard to believe this would be the response to a straight couple in the same situation. Hell, I bet even two women in this situation could manage to get someone to help them.
And now we come to the low point in the film. Lutz leaves Bruno, and as a last desperate shot at fame Bruno attempts to become straight thinking it will help him achieve stardom.
Bruno goes to a gay converter, who’s advice basically boils down to “accept Jesus and you’ll just stop being gay.” The director intentionally dressed Bruno in an incredibly over-the-top outfit which included thigh high lace up boots, booty shorts and a BDSM collar. The converter of course, does not so much at bat an eye at this choice in dress. (Cause that’s just how gay guys look, right?) He also stops by an Alabama martial arts class, where he asks the instructor how he can best defend himself against homosexuals. The instructor, of course, gives him some tips concluding that “they would probably attack from behind.” In a deleted scene he goes on to describe gays as having “a voice half way between a man and a woman.”
Next, Bruno tries out some boot camp training. One corporal becomes very angry and flustered over Bruno complimenting his skin; “What…!? What are you saying, candidate!?” He’s far more upset over this then Bruno accidentally referring to a superior as “mein furer.” His meetings go on and on like this for the next little while, including an outing with some hunters who are so terrified to be in the presence of a gay man they cock and load their weapons and threaten the camera operators.
And now, we come to one of the most disturbing scenes in the film in terms of the way real people treat Bruno. Bruno attends a swingers party with some middle aged couples who are all disturbingly eager to be on camera.
The crew hired a woman to come to the party with Bruno. She believed he was a real person and was told that if she could seduce him she’d get twice the money. So, while Bruno is awkwardly wandering through the house as everyone fucks, this woman pulls him into an empty bedroom and locks the door. Baron Cohen is in character, playing up his awkwardness and is very visibly uncomfortable. In other words, he clearly isn’t interested in having sex with her (or anybody). She ignores the obvious and rips off his shirt.
Next we cut to the woman on the bed, completely naked, with a tight grip on Bruno’s wrist. He says that things are moving too fast and flat out tells her he isn’t interested. She then grabs on to his other wrist and pulls him on to the bed, telling him aggressively to “sit the fuck down.”
Again, he tells her he doesn’t want to have sex, and she repeats herself twice grabbing a belt and whipping him with it. And I mean, hard. She beats him mercilessly with this belt throughout the scene. Sacha Baron Cohen actually got seriously injured. She left enormous red welts all over his skin, and actually broke his thumb.
She rips his pants off and for the third time Bruno makes an excuse to try and get out of the situation. She responds with “Would you quit being a little bitch here and take those briefs off before I fucking rip them?” He does take them off, but has another pair of underwear underneath. This really gets her mad and it is at this point that she really becomes ruthless with the belt. She will not stop hitting him, and Baron Cohen’s only way out winds up being through the window.
I mean, whether this is representative of a lot of people or not is kind of irrelevant. The fact that any person would respond this way to being denied sex is extremely disturbing. I think this is a perfect example of the fact that people believe men should always be up for sex at any time with any woman. Director Larry Charles (who filmed the scene) recounts on the DVD commentary that he knew Sacha Baron Cohen being raped here was a possibility and was prepared to step in should he have to.
Finally we get to the climax of the film and the biggest stunt/prank/gag whatever you wanna call it. From a character perspective, Bruno has turned himself into the very antithesis to himself. He has reached moderate fame as “Straight Dave”, the homophobic cage fight host. In reality, the production rented out a space and promoted the event “Straight Dave’s Man Slamming Maxout” in Arkansas, gathering a fairly big turn out. I mean, “Straight Dave” gets these people to chant “straight pride”. These are people who, without a hint of irony or self awareness, bought these T-shirts.
In case you can’t quite make it out that is in fact an American flag, bottles of liquor, two crossed hunting rifles, two disembodied pairs of tits and the words “Straight Dave’s United Straights of America.”
Actually, I didn’t see anyone else wearing this one so this guy may have just brought it from home.
So, as Straight Dave shouts out one homophobic sweeping generalization after another, the crowd eats it up. They go wild, they absolutely love Straight Dave. “Who’s ready for a good old fashioned hetero-fest!?” “Are you one hundred percent hetero, like me!?” “It’s great to have an evening with straight people. It’s great to not have any fags here.” Well, that’s when shit hits the fan. Because who should be in the audience hearing all this crap but our old pal Lutz? So, he heckles Bruno who then challenges him to get in the ring. The crowd loves it, they cannot get enough of this pudgy German Austrian beating the shit out of Straight Dave.
They’ve got the whole nine yards. They’ve got fight choreography, blood capsules…. Finally Bruno gets a few hits in, manages to pin Lutz and… Their eyes lock and they kiss. The crowd is horrified. They keep going, they start full on making out. The crowd is livid. They shout slurs, they scream, women cover their mouths in horror, men are crying. Men are actually crying! Women shout “Nooo!”They start throwing everything they can get their hands on into the ring. Garbage, food, beer, metal chairs. Baron Cohen and Hammarsten are making out, dodging chairs left and right. Luckily they had a secret escape tunnel built into the ring or they would have certainly been hurt far worse. In fact, they attempted to film the scene a few days prior in another Arkansas town but somebody climbed over the chain link and attempted to assault them. That’s why when they filmed it again, they made sure to put barbed wire around the cage. The guy playing the announcer was hospitalized. In this shot you can see some fresh cuts from being hit with a chair.
Sacha Baron Cohen made an interesting comment in the DVD commentary. These people came out to see violence and bloodshed, and they were furious when instead they were given affection. Men beating the shit out of each other is great, but men expressing love for each other is crossing some sort of line with these peoples sensibilities. Two guys making out makes these people extremely uncomfortable. To the point where the only action they can think of to take is to get violent. Once again, people try to get inside. I mean, men in this audience want these two dead. A lot of people don’t really understand why, or believe that gay bashing happens. I think to have it captured on video to this scale, and in a mainstream film, is important.
So it’s very clear that Bruno exposes homophobia, among other things, much in the same way that Borat exposed racism (among other things).
But how does the film work as part of Queer Cinema? Bruno is one of the very few mainstream films focusing on a gay romance, and it is the third highest grossing film with a gay lead character of all time.
This brings us to the purely scripted portion of the film. The story is much better developed and more interesting then it was in Borat, mainly because Bruno’s sidekick is much more three dimensional then Borat’s. Now Borat also had a bit of a love story happening, but Bruno’s is more successful because the sidekick and the love interest in this film are the same character so we the audience spends more time with him and the two characters have a more interesting relationship. In fact, Bruno is a superior film to Borat in every way. The scripted story is better structured and executed, it’s funnier, the pranks and reactions are more extreme. Everything Borat did right, Bruno does better and then some. Yet, Bruno wasn’t nearly as successful. And sequels usually do better at the box office. Director Larry Charles says that Bruno makes Americans too uncomfortable.
“It’s not because Bruno is a meaner character [than Borat]. It’s because people are meaner to Bruno. It shows a darker side of the American psyche.”
I think that’s true. I think being shown how hateful their own country can be makes American audiences uncomfortable. (After all, the film was successful in Canada and Europe.) YourMovieSucksDOTorg gives us another theory. It’s the fact that Bruno is gay that makes people uncomfortable. Audiences were uncomfortable with Bruno for the same reason the people in the film were. Where as others wrote the film off as being homophobic.
“Seriously, especially if you’re not gay yourself, shut the fuck up. Like how stupid do you have to be to be like; ‘Oh, Bruno the gay stereotype character is overtly promiscuous and doesn’t know how to take care of children, therefore this movie is trying to say all gay people do that….’ If you’re really going to try and reenforce your own opinions under the guise of ‘that’s wrong because it’s offensive to gay people’, isn’t it more offensive to treat all gay people like we’re too stupid to fucking understand a joke? What’s offensive is that I would want to censor certain types of media because it hurt my feelings.”
So let’s talk about that love story. After all, there’s a reason this movie is technically classed as a romantic comedy. The story itself is pretty standard, but hey, there’s only like 7 stories you can tell anyways and 3 of them are romances so… Besides, it’s not the plot beats that make a story interesting, it’s the characters and the individual events.
I actually found myself caring about this relationship. And I am not one to even like romantic plots in movies, I mean when Claire and whats-his-name kissed in Jurassic World I was utterly baffled. But the Bruno and Lutz relationship is actually nicely done. I mean, all of these types of comedies have a love story, but can you remember anything about the romance from Ricky Bobby, Blades of Glory, Bridesmaids, Pitch Perfect etc? In his very first scene we see Lutz give Bruno a loving glance, but it isn’t totally obvious that anything is going to develop between them, mainly because the subtlety of it is sort of hidden behind the jokes in the scene.
Lutz is the only member of his entourage to stick by Bruno after he is fired, and he becomes the second protagonist of the film. Lots of short scenes are dedicated to the two speaking in German, delivering jokes and conversational dialogue.
Fairly early on, after Paula Abdul has Bruno blacklisted we get the first hint that Bruno is attracted to Lutz in return. While Lutz is on the phone getting the plot relevant information Bruno is checking out his ass, before quickly catching himself. Stuff like this works really well for romances that are in movies that are primarily of another genre. When you almost disguise important moments like this as jokes it’s much less forced or shoehorned, and it’s not as easy for the audience to guess what’s going to happen. But at the same time, it doesn’t come out of nowhere. (Jurassic World, looking at you…)
As the film goes on we see just how dedicated to Bruno Lutz is as an assistant, and yet again, it doubles as both character development and humour. A perfect example is the scene right after Bruno comes back to LA with OJ. In this scene we not only get a dumb dildo joke, but we also get the idea that despite the bizarre circumstances these people can actually work as a family.
That’s probably another thing that appeals particularly to me about this story. I really like stories about a hodgepodge of people who come together through strange circumstances to form this unconventional family. It’s what I really liked about Duckman, Trailer Park Boys and Venture Brothers.
Later on when the kid gets taken away, you do wind up feeling sympathy for Bruno. He wanders off after the show and Lutz has to go find him. It is at this point we get the first bit of actual romance. It is only now in this emotionally vulnerable state that Bruno tells Lutz that he does in fact return his feelings. After the bondage prank, we get another scripted scene after the two are finally unlocked. This is probably the strongest of the 100% fictional scenes. It’s both shot and acted very traditionally, which is affective in getting the audience to form the emotional investment they need to have in Bruno’s character at this point. His only friend abandons him because he’s too good to admit he loves somebody so ordinary. Now left homeless and alone, we come to the low point of the story. Bruno changes everything about the very core of who he is and becomes the vile and wretched Straight Dave. All for the very last thing he has left, that slim chance of celebrity. Bruno starts off the story wanting to be famous for his “talents”. When that doesn’t work, he tries a sex tape. He tries charity, he tries getting a kid to parade around. By the end he’s so desperate he becomes someone entirely different. A homophobic asshole with no sense of fashion.
Lutz winds up being in the audience and this of course leads to the stunt. But from the perspective of the fictional narrative, Lutz see’s that Bruno has achieved this tiny bit of fame by becoming everything he hates. He see’s him saying all this disgusting shit, and he see’s how weak he is. He’s fucking pissed, that’s why he starts whaling on him. Everything in these types of scenes serves the dual purpose of trolling and character development. And then of course the kiss happens, because, well, there’s no denying they’re in love with each other.
This kiss is also the defining moment where Bruno’s character (not his persona he presents, but his very being) changes. All the lessons he needed to learn from the story cultivate in this one moment. Firstly, the reason Bruno rejected Lutz was because he was too good for him. Bruno was attractive, fashionable, he used to be kind of famous, he’s supposedly talented. Lutz was just a dumpy assistant, so he didn’t want to be seen with him. But here, Bruno is giving up the small amount of status he has left. Not only by making out with someone below his league publicly, but by showing his fans that he is the very thing they all hate passionately. At this moment, he no longer cares what other people think, he no longer cares about celebrity.
The scene is actually very passionate. It’s a display of pure love and attraction amongst a violent riot. Bruno before this has only ever known bizarre, kinky and impersonal sex. We see this at the beginning with his first boyfriend, and by the contraption Lutz and Bruno find themselves locked into. In this scene though, it is the first time Bruno has a purely romantic and intimate sexual encounter, again, despite the chaos going on around them.
So in the end, when we get that feel good happy ending, where Bruno gets to have his little bit of fame as himself, he gets his guy and his baby, it’s satisfying. It’s a very nice ending, and despite the ridiculousness of Bruno and the bizarre scenarios we saw play out, it’s actually nice to see them get together. I actually like this romance a lot. In fact, the only other time I remember really liking a romance in a comedy was in Zack and Miri Make a Porno. And that one also involved the two lead characters. I guess romances work in comedies when they are actually what the story is about, rather then some side character and the main in some shoved in love story because Hollywood rules dictate your movie end with the formation of a couple.
Awesome 