The Donald Trump movie The Apprentice—which chronicles Trump’s rise as a real-estate developer—made its hotly-anticipated debut at the Cannes Film Festival in the South of France Monday.
Trump is played in The Apprentice by Sebastian Stan, who starred in several Avengers films and such hits as I, Tonya and The Martian. In his review of the film, Pete Hammond of Deadline—who called the film a “devilish origin story” in the critique’s headline—was quick to point out what the movie was actually about.
“This is not a movie version of the NBC reality TV series in any way, but instead a smart, sharp and surprising origin story of the man who hosted it,” Hammond writes.
The Apprentice is set in the 1970s and focuses on the future member of Forbes’ Real-Time Billionaires List while he was in his 20s. The film also keys in on Trump’s relationship with his lawyer Roy Cohn (played by Succession star Jeremy Strong).
The official logline for the film reads, “The Apprentice is a dive into the underbelly of the American empire. It charts a young Donald Trump’s ascent to power through a Faustian deal with the influential right-wing lawyer and political fixer Roy Cohn.”
Hammond writes in his Deadline review that the film is still seeking a U.S. distributor and questioned whether it will be sold to anyone to exhibit in theaters before the U.S. presidential election. After all, the film is not at all what it might seem to be to viewers.
“This is not a hit job on Trump, and actually considering the 77-year-old we see today at MAGA rallies and dozing off in courtrooms defending his indictments on various charges including starting an insurrection to overturn the 2020 election,” Hammond writes. “Instead, it presents a person somewhat driven but awkward, a man striving for the approval of a tough-love father, unsure but determined to succeed and even oddly charming at times.”
What Are Other Critics Saying About ‘The Apprentice’?
Like Deadline, other major trade outlet critics who screened The Apprentice in Cannes are giving high marks to the film, which is directed by Ali Abbasi and written by Roger Ailes biographer Gabriel Sherman.
The Apprentice—which is in competition at Cannes—also stars Maria Bakalova as Ivana Trump and veteran actor Martin Donovan as Donald Trump’s father Fred Trump Sr. Child actress Emily Mitchell plays the younger version of Trump’s daughter Ivanka.
In David Rooney’s review for The Hollywood Reporter, the critic deemed Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong’s performances as “superb.” He did note, however, that viewers’ perception of The Apprentice as a whole will differ depending on their political persuasion.
“Liberals will see it as a stomach-churning making-of-a-monster account while the MAGA faithful might conceivably misconstrue it as an endorsement of their guy, who has made the killer instinct his brand,” Rooney writes in his THR review. “That’s not to say the movie’s political sympathies are unclear. But if the Trump years have taught us anything, it’s that truth is elastic and perception can be skewed to whatever angle is most expedient.”
Owen Gleiberman of Variety also called out Stan for his impressive performance as Trump, even if the film falls short of unraveling the mystery of the young Trump years before he was elected president.
“For its first half, The Apprentice is kind of a knockout: the inside look at how Trump evolved that so many of us have imagined for so long, and seeing it play out is both convincing and riveting,” Owen Gleiberman writes in Variety. “Yet I have an issue with the movie, and it all pivots around the mystery of Trump. I don’t think The Apprentice ever penetrates it.”
The Apprentice isn’t the only high-profile film looking for U.S. distribution at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival. Last week, director Francis Ford Coppola staged a red carpet premiere of his sci-fi opus Megalopolis in the South of France in an effort to attract a U.S. buyer.
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