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Amazon Paid $80 Million For Borat 2
Amazon reportedly paid $80 million to acquire the exclusive streaming rights for Sacha Baron Cohen's hit sequel Borat: Subsequent MovieFilm. The movie, the existence of which was only revealed in September, was released on Amazon Prime last Friday, October 23. It's opening weekend was bigger than Mulan's, with the mockumentary attracting hundreds of thousands more viewers than Disney's live-action remake, though that movie came with a hefty rental fee attached on Disney+. British comic Cohen reprises his iconic role for Borat: Subsequent MovieFilm, a Kazakh reporter character he originally created for his BBC TV show Ali G In Da House.
The Borat movie was subsequently released in 2006, and became a cultural phenomenon. However, in recent years, Cohen had largely retired Borat, due to him being easily recognizable in character. As a result, much of Borat: Subsequent MovieFilm is focused on Borat's 15-year-old daughter Tutar, played by 24-year-old Bulgarian actor Maria Bakalova. Her storyline includes a controversial scene involving Rudy Giuliani, the former mayor of New York City and current personal lawyer of US President Donald Trump.
Now, a new report from Deadline reveals Amazon Prime paid $80 million for the exclusive streaming rights for Borat: Subsequent MovieFilm. The report cites multiple sources for the figure, and adds the streaming deal was born out of Cohen's desire to release it before the election. Universal Pictures, who had secured the theatrical distribution rights, didn't want to release it during the pandemic, and so let Cohen shop the movie around to streamers in order for his desired release date to be met. Cohen also insisted the movie be a streaming release, to attract as large an audience as possible, as opposed to a VOD release that would add an additional fee. It's not known who else was in the running, if anyone, but Amazon Prime's winning bid was $80 million.
Given the success of the movie, and the news coverage around it, its seems like Amazon's decision to lay down such a large amount of money has paid off. And Cohen managed to get the film released before the US Presidential election like he wanted. Whether the movie's many controversial scenes, including one in which Cohen bursts into a CPAC meeting featuring Vice President Michael Pence wearing a Donald Trump mask, will convince voters one way or the other remains to be seen. What is clear, though, is fans have responded to the movie, and are streaming it in large numbers.
It now makes sense why Amazon went all in on marketing efforts for Borat: Subsequent MovieFilm, including sending a number of 40-foot nearly-naked Borat inflatables down rivers in major cities. They were clearly convinced the movie would be a success and it has turned out that way. What this might mean for future smaller budget movies is unknown, but it's clear the pandemic has changed the way studios and stars think about movie distribution, and it may well affect viewing habits forever.
