"Borat" To Get the Oscar?

Here's the film critic of the London Sun, Johnny Vaughan, explaining why Borat should capture an Academy Award.

Sacha Baron Cohen so deserved this Golden Globe nomination and I think he has got to be in with a shout for an Oscar. There are three reasons for that.
Firstly, actors talk about taking risks — Sacha has got to score higher in that department than anyone else.

He physically put his character into the real world.

He risked a lynching from those good old boys at the rodeo. That was no duck walk.

Secondly, suspending disbelief. When I saw it I couldn’t tell what was fact or fiction. Was, for example, Pamela Anderson in on the joke or not?

Thirdly, I don’t think there has been anyone since the days of Robert De Niro in Raging Bull — where he put on 60lb — who has got so immersed in his character.

In fact, Sacha got so immersed that he stuck his face up a 40st man’s a**e. Dustin Hoffman has never been near that.

He even does his interviews in character and remains funny.

We have not had someone who has been a worldwide comedy phenomenon like Sacha since Peter Sellers.

I was never a big Ali G fan. But I am huge Borat fan. The film is sophisticated. It even sends up the viewer.

It is also anti-George Bush and really sends up the brainlessness of anti-Semitism. That is going to win it votes at the Academy. They might nominate Cohen just to annoy Mel Gibson.