I’m sure the words ‘Trump biopic’ would be greeted by groans from many. Over the last decade especially, seeing Donald Trump on our screens has been a source of immense displeasure, whether it’s the man himself, or the abundance of tiresome impressions that seemingly never end.
And given how much Hollywood loves a biopic at the moment, this took a surprising amount of time to get off the ground. After it was announced in 2018 that The Apprentice was going to be written by journalist and first-time screenwriter Gabriel Sherman, the film went around to various filmmakers, being turned down by the likes of Paul Thomas Anderson and Clint Eastwood. Thank God we didn’t have to see an Eastwood version of this; instead, we got a much more interesting pick for director, with Ali Abbasi, the Danish-Iranian filmmaker behind the critically acclaimed Persian-language film Holy Spider (2022).
The project really picked up steam when it signed on its two stars, Sebastian Stan – of Marvel fame – as Trump himself, and Succession’s Jeremy Strong as his mentor figure, Roy Cohn. The film, rather than just telling Trump’s life story, centres around these two characters’ relationship, something that benefits the film hugely.
The film begins in the 70s with Trump working under the thumb of his father, placing him essentially as little more than a bailiff, in an early scene showing him collecting the rent due in his father’s block of flats. He then meets Cohn, a brutal lawyer who helps the Trumps get away with a racist discrimination court-case by blackmailing the judge. From here, Cohn mentors Trump and represents him as the Trump mythos begins to emerge.
The pair’s relationship is the most interesting part of the film by leaps and bounds. Cohn teaches Trump that morality is something to be twisted and that one must always claim victory even if you lose, but crucially, Abbasi never levels the accusation that Cohn made Trump. Trump, while even a little sympathetic at the narrative’s beginning, is shown as a man who would happily sell out his morals the second Cohn suggests it, only to have grown far more monstrous than Cohn himself by the end of the film.
Crucial in making this work are these two performances. On hearing that Sebastian Stan was going to play Trump, I was sceptical: I like Captain America: The Winter Soldier as much as the next man, but I had my doubts as to whether he could pull off a more serious role. But mostly, I think he managed it. The key to his success as Trump is that he doesn’t do the voice. He doesn’t even really look like Trump, apart from when the camera shoots him at just the right angle, but this is a positive. It allows us to reckon with him as a man and not a cartoon, which is the aim of the whole film.
Unfortunately for Stan, though, was having to play against Jeremy Strong’s phenomenal turn as Cohn. Despite the fact that he is truly abhorrent, you can’t take your eyes off him when he’s on screen, really showing why Trump would idolise him at this stage. Even the way he walks is menacing; it’s as if he’s summoned a dark, glowing aura around himself. It’s far from one-note, though, despite how ghoulish he plays Cohn to be at the beginning of the film. By the end, when Cohn has been diagnosed with AIDS, Strong is able to muster so much sympathy for the character that he turns from evil to deeply tragic.
The film suffers when Strong is absent from it. As the Cohn/Trump relationship begins to crumble and the film centres more on Trump’s business ventures, the film loses a bit of steam. It’s in this second half of the film where it becomes painfully unsubtle. There are multiple conversations that hint towards a future presidential bid, which are presented like some sort of Marvel end-credit teaser of what’s to come.
There’s a scene later on when Trump is visited by a member of Ronald Reagan’s team, where he’s given a badge that says ‘let’s make America great again’, and the camera holds on it for what feels like an eternity, just to really make sure that we know it’s a reference to Trump’s slogan. These moments are unfortunately not uncommon, and play into the most irritating tropes of Trump depictions.
This is also the part of the film where we see far more of Ivana Trump, played by Maria Bakalova (seen in Borat 2), and her relationship with Trump. Bakalova does a good job, but doesn’t have much to work with, being largely there as a demonstration of the cruelty that Trump enacts. There is a disturbing scene where Trump sexually assaults his wife, a scene that is excruciating to watch but does show Trump’s brutal reliance on and need for power over those around him. It’s in these moments where the film takes on a heightened intensity and more resembles a thriller, with Trump as the threat.
This aspect of the film is one that has drawn the attention of Trump himself, who recently called the film “A FAKE and CLASSLESS Movie written about me” made by “HUMAN SCUM”, claiming that he had “a great relationship” with his former wife. Trump’s lawyers served the film a cease-and-desist, stating it was “a concoction of lies”, as early as the film’s debut at Cannes, but hasn’t taken any actual legal action, largely because the film does not depict any events, including this sexual assault, that are legally untrue.
Ali Abbasi has stated that the film is “retelling information that is freely and readily available everywhere, and it’s fact-checked and triple-checked”, and has recently asked if he could have a personal meeting with Trump to show him the film.
That being said, the film does not act as some kind of exposé of Trump; it shows him as the cruel and power-hungry bigot that he is, but anyone watching already knows that. It spends its time with more value, reckoning with the kind of culture that can uplift and promote a man like this to such high stature. It’s not perfect by any means, but it is far better than it had any right to be.
