Ali G Indahouse
Written: Nov 12 '04
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Unrelenting toilet humor.
Cons: Not for everybody.
The Bottom Line: Silly, stupid, offensive fun!
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| phungus's Full Review: Ali G in da House |
In case you’ve never heard of him before, Ali G is the alter-ego of a gangly Brit named Sacha Baron Cohen. He’s a white guy who dresses in a skull cap, Fubu clothing, giant rings, and oversized shoes. There are a number of words used to describe white people that dress and act like people of another race, but I will refrain from using those words here. Ali G earned his fame in England by setting up ridiculous interviews with unsuspecting members of government. He eventually got so popular that nobody would let themselves be interviewed so Ali G set up camp in America and is doing the same gig for HBO in Da Ali G Show. Some of his latest interview victims have included Newt Gingrich and Andy Rooney.
Ali G Indahouse was made in 2002, toward the end of his career in the UK. The movie was a minor hit but I’ve read that it was produced too late in his career for people to be interested in it, sort of like when Vanilla Ice made Cool As Ice. Comparisons to Vanilla Ice are inevitable with Ali G, but Sacha Baron Cohen is light years ahead of Rob Van Winkle in terms of originality and intelligence. Cohen has the ability to assume different roles much like Peter Sellers. I have no idea what the real guy is like.
The basic plot of Ali G Indahouse is that a British politician seeks to gain a higher level position in the Parliament. To do so, he needs a candidate to first come in and be so bad that he will be removed from office, thus allowing the politician to step up from his current position. The details of how British government works are not clearly explained, so for an American like me, I just sort of go along with it. Considering how the rest of the movie is, I’m sure all aspects of realism have been tossed out. Basically, they use Ali G as a proxy, but as you might expect his humor ends up earning the respect of the people and then the politician sets out to destroy him. The story is nothing original.
You have to enjoy low-brow humor to get this movie. If you love movies like Team America World Police or Scary Movie, then you will probably enjoy this. It is not quite as ridiculous as Freddy Got Fingered, but it can be just as intolerable if you don’t like the main character. Most PG rated comedies bore me and most PG-13 ones try to get away with so much that they become annoying. I don’t get offended by much so I get a kick out of stuff like Ali G Indahouse. If you love his show on HBO, then you will definitely love this movie. It’s a stupid kind of funny and had me laughing out loud several times.
Ali G Indahouse has plenty of offensive material for everyone. In one scene Ali G meets the Queen (you know, of England) and accidentally pulls down her skirt to find that she…umm…shaves, which greatly impresses him. In one of the craziest moments, he is handcuffed to a fence and someone yanks down his pants. A beautiful woman walks by and he forces himself to get an erection in order to impress her. While he’s standing there ‘at attention’ a blind man comes around cleaning the petal fence posts. As you can imagine, the blind man mistakes a certain part of Ali G as a fence post and well…that’s the kind of movie this is. Nothing is actually showed, but not much is left to the imagination either. There’s more than enough profanity and sexism in this movie to keep your jaw open until the credits roll. One of the funniest scenes is where Ali G is trying to impress a beautiful woman by dancing. He trips over himself and tries to play it off with some goofy break dancing movies while he’s on the floor. It’s one of those ‘you just gotta see it’ scenes.
The whole ‘white guy acting black’ thing is nothing new in the United States. You can go down to the mall and see people acting like that all day long. However, I am making the assumption that this phenomenon occurs much less frequently in the UK. I think that’s why the Ali G character seems so much more extreme overseas. When people give Ali G trouble over his behavior, he asks one of his trademark questions - “Is it cuz I black?”
If you are a fan of Da Ali G Show, like me, then you need to check out this movie. A lot of people find this guy intolerable, but I think he’s completely hilarious. Then again, I’m one of the people who saw Team America twice and plan on buying the DVD, so that should give you an idea of what my comic tastes are like.
Recommended:
Yes
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