 "Must have in your DVD collection" | 2010-02-17 |
| - Reviewed By D. Sanders from Melbourne,Australia |
I am a huge fan of Sacha Baron Cohen. I believe he is one of the Best character actors in the industry. His variety of characters keep you entertained and laughing throughout each segment. This HBO Ali G series is a must have in your DVD collection. He is definitely keepin it real.
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| "Great Show Improves With Viewings" | 2009-12-04 |
| - Reviewed By The ESOL Teacher from Webster, NY United States |
| This show becomes more relevant with age not less relevant. An interesting group of characters Sasha Baron Cohen creates reveals many facets of American life, especially politics. Always catching people off guard and trying to be on their best behavior, D Ali G, Borat and Bruno seem to expose people for their best and worst facets of their personalities despite their attempts to look good. I found show off-putting and confusing at first but the show has only grown on me with repeated viewings. Try it, you might like it. |
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| "As funny as it gets" | 2009-08-13 |
| - Reviewed By Sergio Aguilar Meza |
Ali G, Borat and Brüno. One of the biggest displays of creativity I've seen. Sacha Baron Cohen is a genious. This TV show not only makes you laugh, it also makes you want to be part of the show or be as naive and outgoing as the characters.
Well spent money! |
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| "One of the most fascinating comedians of our age" | 2009-07-20 |
| - Reviewed By Robert Moore from Chicago, IL USA |
I had a great political science professor as an undergraduate, Jim Ranchino, a student of William Appleman Williams. Nothing angered Ranchino so much as lightly examined or passively accepted ideas. His goal as a professor, he said, was to raise our "B.S. quotient." To this end, he would try to make us challenge him. On occasion he would do his best to make his students challenge him, to force us to refuse to accept him as an authority, even intentionally lying for the entire class period, making up increasingly outrageous "facts" about, say, the war in the Pacific in WW II or the beliefs of some political philosopher. His goal was not to get us to ingest a certain body of "facts," but to get us to question, to challenge, and confront.
I think Jim Ranchino would have appreciated Sascha Baron Cohen's humor. His three alter egos - Ali G., Borat, and Brûno - are among the most challenging comic characters to have appeared in the past couple of decades. They are challenging both because Cohen uses them to challenge and satirize our almost limitless gullibility. Ali G. is a brilliant caricature of wannabes, people who are so fake that they themselves are unaware of it. We don't know what Ali G.'s real name is, but we know that he is a white, upper-class twit. He talks of "Keeping it real," yet he is so self-deceived that he can confront his viewers by asking, "Haven't you ever seen a black man before?" So on one level we laugh at Ali G. because he is a self-deceived idiot, but on another we laugh at the people who are taken in by his fraud. And since many of the people Ali G. deceives are people that we look up to in our culture, the joke is on us as well. Cohen's strategy is perhaps best seen in a skit where Brûno interviews a man in charge of a fashion show and asks him a string of questions that directly contradict one another, such as "Why was everything so light?" follows by "Why was everything so heavy?" His final question in the interview is, "Is consistency important to you?"
Of course, this constant puncturing of the pretensions of our culture would be merely an intellectual exercise if the series wasn't also hysterically funny. There are times in DA ALI G. SHOW when I laugh about as hard as it is possible for me to laugh. There are also times when I merely winch. Cohen is almost always on the edge in his humor, which how he likes it. Much of the time when I watch him, I'm extremely uncomfortable; the rest of the time I'm laughing my head off. In one scene I might be dying as Ali G. asks Buzz Aldrin, "Will man ever set foot on the sun?" (After Aldrin assures him that we will not, ever, because it is too hot, Ali G. asks, "What if we were to go during the winter?") In another I might feel uneasy compassion for some poor soul as Borat shows pornographic Polaroids of him and his sister. Sometimes his skits show us at our worse, such as the glee with which patrons in a country western bar join Borat in singing "Throw the Jew Down the Well." Are we, we wonder, really that racist beneath the surface? Or are the people in the bar oblivious as to the meaning of the lyrics?
Cohen has a longstanding interest in prejudice and hatred of otherness. At Cambridge University his studies were centered on the American civil rights movement in the sixties (I've wondered if his frequent visits to Mississippi on his shows are related to his academic background). I'm not saying that everything on Cohen's shows has an elevated purpose or is high-minded, but I do believe that it is part of the mix. Obviously he is first and foremost an entertainer more than willing to take the low road for a laugh, but it is also obvious that his questions often have other purposes.
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| "Sacha is a sheer genius." | 2009-07-10 |
| - Reviewed By WonkyHonkie from SB, Californie, US&A |
| Sacha Baron Cohen pulls of these three characters amazingly. I don't understand how he does it. Not to mention how none of them look remotely alike. Bruno is probably the funniest. . He makes fashion icons look like complete dipsh&*$. It's great to see how dumb all fashion connoisseurs truly are. Ali G is great. These episodes are WAY better than the Ali G movie which was complete crap. And Borat is just ridiculous. Well each character is ridiculous in their own way but every episode will keep you laughing. However the main reason why I wanted to write this is review is to ask anybody if they know the name of the song that's on the main menu and who wrote it. So if anybody knows, if you wouldn't mind please reply on this. |
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 "aligboratbruno" | 2009-04-24 |
| - Reviewed By An Amazon User |
I just saw a promo for "Bruno" (the movie) a month ago and thought I'd check out some of his early stuff. BTW - Bruno was my favorite and I'm looking forward to the movie in mid July 2009. I've never seen "Borat" and never will now after seeing this DVD set. The best thing about Ali G was the opening sequence of each episode - the suit up. The whip snapping sound of the waist band on his Tommy H shorts was priceless. Still cracks me up.
Quote from another reviewer:
"You end up feeling sorry for the people he interviews instead of laughing at them, and at the same time respecting them for tolerating Mr. Cohen..." That about sums it ALL up. One segment (repeated twice during the seasons) comes to mind is when Borat has a room full of people stand up and have 10 minutes of silence (for whatever). If someone made a noise he would start the 10 minutes over. Stupid and cruel.
3 out of 5
I'm still looking forward to "Bruno" the movie.
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