The Apprentice (Abbasi, 2024)

 Written by Andie Kaiser

In the midst of the US presidential election, Ali Abbasi’s The Apprentice hit theatres this past Friday, telling the story of a young Donald Trump (Sebastian Stan) beginning his business ventures in the 1970s and 80s. Set primarily in New York City, the film captures the sleazy corruption of its subjects through grainy montages and cameras that shakily follow Trump in and out of nightclubs and business meetings. 

Acting as a sort of origin story, the film focuses on Trump’s relationship with lawyer Roy Cohn (Jeremy Strong), who mentors Trump in everything from buying clothes to blackmailing legal opponents. It’s an interesting angle to take, highlighting how Trump essentially made a name for himself by imitating men like Cohn. At a time in which the world is all-too-familiar with Trump’s behaviour, Abbasi works to show how so much of what we associate with him came directly from Cohn. What I appreciate most about the film’s approach is its commitment to showing Trump as someone who is, and always has been, an unintelligent loser. We see him throwing up after drinking too much with Cohn, falling down in front of Ivanna (Maria Bakalova), and generally looking like a confused child on several occasions. It rejects the notion that Trump is some kind of “evil genius,” but rather that he has learned over time to talk and act like the “strong men” he both admires and fears.

It’s a film that relies almost entirely on the performances of Stan and Strong, who embody their “characters” with an impressive level of realism. Tasked with playing truly soulless individuals, it seems impossible that the actors would’ve been able to tap into any “inner life” of Trump or Cohn, and their portrayals keep me convinced that neither man actually has one. Stan and Strong could easily have gone with the full SNL-parody route, but they (and the film at large) are clearly trying to present something different. Often, the most striking moments of resemblance are the smallest ones: a particular grimace or tilt of the head immediately evokes Trump, and Strong can bring out Cohn through his posture alone. In particular, the movements of Stan’s mouth and Strong’s eyes are what stay with me after watching.

The film is definitely strongest when it leans into the narrative about how these two corrupt men enable and use one another. When it attempts to deal with aspects of Trump’s personal or “home” life, it becomes a lot harder to shake the feeling that you’re watching a dramatization about Donald Trump. As viewers, we already know about what he has done to women, and including such moments of extreme violence in a film about real, living people felt not only unnecessary but extremely uncomfortable.

Ultimately, it’s a film whose existence I can’t quite wrap my head around. In many ways it lives within a space that might not appeal to many people: Trump supporters will certainly have no interest in it, and those of us who already hate Trump might not want to see any more of the man than we have to. It’s also unlikely that audiences going into it will come away with any huge new revelations about Trump or his history; though perhaps that’s not the point. My question then would only be, what is?

Photo credits to New Statesman, The Hollywood Reporter, and The New York Times.