Offensive, Crude, Hilarious

At last, a comedy that lives up to its hype. Ali G may have outstayed his welcome by the time he made the leap to the big screen but Borat, Sacha Baron Cohen's other creation, is far funnier on celluloid than he ever was on TV.

It may be crude. It may use cheap gags. It may be completely offensive to every single minority group there is. But Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, to give it its full title, is hilarious from start to finish.

The film centres around Borat being sent to New York to make a programme about the American way of life for a Kazakhstan TV channel. After watching a Baywatch episode in his hotel room, he suddenly falls in love with Pamela Anderson and decides to travel to California instead, to track her down and then propose.

Unlike the Ali G film, Borat interacts with real people and it's their bewildered reactions to him which provides the most laughter. The formal dinner party scene, where Borat insults the host's wife, invites a prostitute as his guest and brings something to the dinner table you never want to see, is worth the ticket price alone.

As is his brief dalliance with scary Christian evangelists, his horror at discovering he's staying at a B&B run by Jewish people and the homage to Oliver Reed and Alan Bates' naked wrestling in Women In Love, where Borat grapples with his overweight companion, Bagatov, which is both disturbing and the most achingly funny thing you'll see all year.

The humour may not be subtle, but that doesn't mean it's not clever and there are several occasions when it exposes America's blatant sexism, homophobia and racism. Witness how three moronic fratboys describe women or how one rodeo organiser saying he'd like to see all gay people executed.

Perhaps surprisingly, given the Academy Awards' usual disregard for anything comedic, there are whispers of Cohen being nominated for an Oscar. And it would be totally deserved.

This is as far removed from the cliched predictability of his first movie, and at just 90 mins long, it manages the rare thing of leaving you wanting more.