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An ‘outstanding film’ that Donald Trump tried to block from being released is now available to watch on Netflix.
Released in cinemas last year, The Apprentice follows Trump’s rise to become a successful real estate businessman in New York City in the 1970s and 1980s.
It starred Marvel’s Sebastian Stan as the current US President, Succession’s Jeremy Strong as his attorney Roy Cohn, and Borat Subsequent Moviefilm’s Maria Bakalova as Trump’s first wife, Ivana.
Directed by Ali Abbasi, the film was originally announced in 2018 but didn’t move forward until 2023.
Its premiere at the Cannes Film Festival last year sparked an eight-minute standing ovation, with some reviews calling it ‘compelling’, ‘sobering’, and a ‘knockout’.
However, it contained more controversial scenes that show Trump getting liposuction and a ‘disturbing’ depiction of non-consensual sex with his wife.
Due to the subject matter, the film also faced an uphill battle to secure an American distributor, with Trump’s legal team also trying to block it from hitting screens.
The film was eventually released in October last year, which came just a few weeks before the November 5 election, timing that Trump said was done to ‘try and hurt’ his campaign.
He also called the film a ‘defamatory, politically disgusting hatchet job’.
Meanwhile, his campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung said it was ‘garbage’ and claimed it ‘sensationalises lies that have been long debunked’.
‘This “film” is pure malicious defamation, should not see the light of day, and doesn’t even deserve a place in the straight-to-DVD section of a bargain bin at a soon-to-be-closed discount movie store, it belongs in a dumpster fire,’ he added.
Despite Trump and his team doing their best to downplay the film, it was nominated for two Oscars, two Golden Globes, and three Baftas.
In its review, Metro wrote: ‘Someone like Trump is a personality ripe for parody, but The Apprentice has its fun without ever needing to caricature him; it simply shines a light on his past from a future where most people are only too aware of his most exhausting traits…The Apprentice is, without question, a film that gets my vote.’
This week, The Apprentice was added to Netflix, a move that could enrage the politician, whose attorneys initially sent a cease-and-desist letter to the filmmakers in the hopes of blocking its release in the U.S.
‘The film is a fair and balanced portrait of the former president,’ the producers shared at the time. ‘We want everyone to see it and then decide.’
When asked about playing Trump, Stan explained it was a ‘well-crafted character built from rage and years of suppression’.
‘If the movie is really just sort of so irrelevant, then why warrant that reaction from him to begin with?’ he told The New York Times when asked about Trump’s scathing response.
AFP via Getty Images)
‘It might be because the truth hurts, and there is something truthful to the movie, one of them probably being that, you know, he doesn’t like anyone else taking credit for the way he is.’
He also explained that he was warned against accepting the job.
‘A CEO of a studio told me not to do it because I was going to alienate half the country, and a casting director, who I respect very much, said, “We don’t need another Trump movie, you’re never going to get any applause for it”,’ he said.
‘But for some reason every time somebody said, “Don’t do it”, it made me want to do it more.’
Meanwhile, Strong told The Times he felt the film was ‘mandatory viewing for any sentient beings who care about what’s happening’ in the US.
‘I think it offers vital insight, which could move the needle in a real way. In this moment where we’re surrounded by rhetoric of hate and divisiveness, I think art has a place and film has a place.’
The Apprentice is streaming on Netflix.
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