Review
America
Culture
Film & TV
Politics
5 min read

Trump: from apprentice to master of contempt

The Trump biopic is a morality tale for our times
An 1980s business man looks contemptuously at the camera.
Sebastian Stan as a young Donald Trump.
Scythia Films.

He won. Donald Trump is, once again, the President of the United States. The controversial property tycoon, controversial ‘billionaire’, controversial reality TV star, and highly controversial one-term (or so it seemed) President, has done it again! Sweeping not only the Electoral College but also the popular vote, Trump will have another four years to ‘Make America Great Again’…whatever that means. The question on most pundits’ lips today is: how? The man who was written off from the first moments he descended into his campaign on that golden escalator; the man who was guaranteed to lose his first (let alone his third!) Presidential bid; the man who has been mired in sexual, financial, constitutional, and legal scandal…how could he win again!? 

Rather than seek answers in the election coverage of last night I went to an alternative source of information. I popped down to my local cinema to watch The Apprentice, Ali Abbasi’s biopic of Trump’s rise to power and prominence, focusing on his ‘apprenticeship’ under pugnacious, pugilistic, flamboyant, and flamingly foul-mouthed lawyer and mentor Roy Cohn. Whether consciously or not – and believe me, it’s so consciously on the nose as to feel like a punch to the nose – the film draws a ruler-straight line from Trump’s early days as Cohn’s disciple to his electoral success in 2016…and now in 2024. 

How did Trump win, not once but twice…? 

…by selling his soul to the Devil. 

We meet Trump and Cohn in an exclusive New York Members Club. Trump is shy and awkward – none of the bombast we know him for – clumsily trying to impress his date by mentioning how he is the youngest member to ever be admitted. Cohn is holding court with some mob-coded friends. Cohn stares at the handsome, golden-haired ingénue (Trump, not his date) across the room through sunken domes. He invites Trump to join him for dinner. The date has gone to ‘powder my nose’ and seemingly has made a lucky escape through the lavatory window. Trump joins Cohn. Cohn bloviates, always with his hand firmly gripping Trump’s thigh. Trump is enamoured…smitten…in love. Cohn becomes his lawyer and Trump his protégé. 

The film goes on to chronicle how, under Cohn’s tutelage, Trump becomes the man we now know. Cohn is committed to winning – under the guise of being committed to America. He teaches Trump his three rules for success:  

  1. Attack, attack, attack. 
  2. Admit nothing. Deny everything. 
  3. Even in defeat, claim victory.  

There is a nice bit of mirroring in the final scene as we see Trump regurgitate these rules, introduced pithily and wittily in the first 30 minutes of the film, in his final exaggerated and bloviated style to a ghost-writer employed to write The Art of the Deal. This is how Trump wins. Throughout the film we watch Trump evolve from the nervous young man, protective of his alcoholic brother and under-the-thumb of his overbearing father, into a monstrous, ad absurdum form of Cohn…a man who will demand absolute submission to his will. 

The film, I wager, is partly a morality tale. It gives us a (slightly) sympathetic young Faustus, and chronicles his descent into Hell, but without a hint of real redemption or pity.

The film is sickeningly enjoyable. Sebastian Stan gently invites us to root for Trump in his timidity, and transforms with a subtlety which leaves the audience questioning their own culpability. Maria Bakalova brings a good-natured innocence to Ivana Trump (née Zelníčková) which steals the few scenes she’s afforded. Jeremy Strong – always watchable – brings his magnetic charisma to the screen. His Cohn is akin to Pacino’s John Milton in The Devil’s Advocate: delightfully chewing the scenery and ingratiating himself to the viewer while being hateful. The film is just over two hours long but doesn’t feel it. Never dragging, never boring. The soundtrack revels in the period, and the needle-drops are near perfect. It’s a really rather fun watch. 

However. 

The film is not nourishing. It is the cinematic equivalent of the junk food that leads to Trump’s expanding waistline (and the liposuction scene that is so difficult to watch). The film painstakingly draws parallels between Trump’s early success and his later political career. Cohn’s rules, Reagan’s campaigning slogans, the arrogance, the (sexual!) violence…everything we associate with Trump today is found in its nascent form in his 1980s career. Yet, none of it really matters because we have no character we want to attach ourselves to. No one, except perhaps Trump’s mother and his first wife, neither of whom have the chance to make enough of an impact, is likable or redeemable. Cohn is slime personified, until a sudden AIDS related conversion to conscience, and we don’t see nearly enough of the pathetic and put-upon Trump to care about his descent into the demonic realm of absolute self-absorption. The script is razor-sharp, but not incisive. The characters are riotously funny, but nowhere near emotionally engaging enough. 

The film, I wager, is partly a morality tale. It gives us a (slightly) sympathetic young Faustus, and chronicles his descent into Hell, but without a hint of real redemption or pity. Mortality makes Cohn recognise the monster he has been the Dr Frankenstein to, but in about ten minutes. We see a relative innocent made villain, but barely having had the chance to care for him in his infancy. No amount of slick script or genuinely bravura performance (Jeremy Strong deserves an Oscar) can make up for the cold and emotionless lens that the film has. In a sense, this gives us a more realistic explanation of Trump’s victory than the film seeks to muster…disdain. 

Like Trump, I deployed ‘alternative facts’. 

I lied. 

I did watch some of the election coverage in the early hours of the morning. As the Trump victory became inexorable, I watched pundit after pundit – who had been excoriating Trump supporters as either stupid or malign only 24 hours before – earnestly explain that it was a lack of engagement with middle-America which had lost it for the Democrats. Tony Hinchcliffe may have made a predictably unpleasant joke about Puerto Rico being a ‘garbage island’, but it was Biden calling even reluctant Trump voters ‘garbage’ which swung the election. We live in a new polarised age where the genuine concerns of the ordinary man or woman, if they can be associated with someone as aesthetically and morally compromised as Trump, make them functionally fascist.  

The Apprentice, simply by being unable to empathise with anyone not in favour, gives us the secret to Trump’s victory. It wasn’t Cohn’s rules. It was his overactive ability to demonstrate his contempt for everyone, and therefore seem to have contempt for no one. His detractors demonstrated the reverse. In the end Trump hasn’t needed to attack, or deny, or claim illegitimate victory. He simply has had to be himself. 

Saaaad. 

 

**** Stars

Review
Community
Culture
Film & TV
Romance
5 min read

Nobody Wants This: the rom-com for tense times

Warning: contains warm depictions of strong community and belief.

Lauren writes on faith, community, and anything else that compels her to open the Notes app. 

A couple together on a sofa watch a laptop,
Kirsten Bell, Adam Brody.
Netflix.

I hope places of worship are ready to be inundated with hopeful singles, because it seems there is a market for spiritual authorities as romantic leads. 

In its latest hit, Nobody Wants This, Netflix saw Fleabag’s ‘Hot Priest’ and raised us ‘Hot Rabbi’. Through ten half-hour episodes – so watchable that it is easily viewed in two sittings or less – we follow the unlikely love story of recently single rabbi Noah, played by Adam Brody, and agnostic sex podcaster Joanne, played by Kristen Bell. The pairing of ‘a rabbi and a sex podcaster’ may sound more like the opening of a politically incorrect joke, but after an impressive 15.9 million views in its first week of streaming, it’s clear that somebody wants this. 

“Tonally, we’re at such a tense time,” shared Brody, as he tried to explain the show’s success. “I think just something that’s very positive and celebrates love, is funny and has a warm feeling. I think people are responding to that.”  

It’s true. In days of emotional heaviness and concern, we shouldn’t be surprised by the resurgence of genuinely good romantic comedies. But I don’t think that is all that accounts for the triumph of Nobody Wants This. Its seamless blend of profound religious concepts with an evolving and exploratory faith continually presents viewers with the idea that there is more and better to life. Its redemptive quality goes beyond the classic strangers-to-lovers storyline. Depictions of strong community and belief in greater things have captured an audience who crave something more than surface-level fluff, even from their rom-coms. 

Perhaps, their allure does not lie in authority, sacred position, or even in appearance, but in the fact that they, too, are real, vulnerable and multi-dimensional people. 

 We meet Joanne who, like many of us, is clumsily curious and searching. Initially, she is on a one-woman mission to prove that her work as a podcaster contributes to ‘something bigger’, then she wants to discover whether she is a ‘good’ person or not. These moments of self-exploration are only side quests in her constant longing for a love more lasting than her previous relationships. The character of Joanne is based on series creator, Erin Foster, who converted to Judaism after meeting her partner and, although the series’ highly criticised portrayal of Jewish women leaves much to be desired throughout the show, the season finale leaves us with a clear emphasis that Joanne is now searching for true belief amid conversion questions. 

In the role of Rabbi Noah, as in Fleabag’s Priest, we glimpse behind the proscenium into the life of someone who has committed to serving God. In their struggles, hopes and complicated relationships, we discover a humanness beyond the lectern, titles and ceremonial clothing. In Noah, we see a man who does not always get it right – who often misses the mark – but who owns up, makes amends and learns from his mistakes. During one particularly moving scene, Noah unashamedly brings the sacred into the mundane by introducing Joanne to her first Shabbat meal over a restaurant date. We see a person of faith who doesn’t allow personal holiness to segregate them from the grit of everyday life and who, above all, prioritises relationship over regimented religion. 

There is an obvious physical attraction to men such as Adam Brody and Andrew Scott playing men of the cloth, which I find equal parts weird and worrying for those unfamiliar with real-life clergy, as they’ve possibly had their expectations set a little high. But I wonder if it is their character’s humility, gentleness and authenticity that compels the audience, drawing us to trust them. Perhaps, their allure does not lie in authority, sacred position, or even in appearance, but in the fact that they, too, are real, vulnerable and multi-dimensional people. In these depictions, the life of faith and self-sacrificial vocation does not seem far-off or removed from our society. Not everyone who comes to faith is going to become a rabbi or a priest, but these men go a long way in dismantling the perception that religion and relationship with God is only for a certain, superhuman people. Far from the fire-and-brimstone stereotype, they are responsive, relatable and – crucially, for a romantic lead – emotionally available. 

Sure, sex and sexual attraction eventually plays a large role in the plot, but how many romantic comedies save their most tender scene for a powerful moment of humble prayer... ?

On another level, the overwhelming response to Nobody Wants This reveals a desire to be part of healthy relationships is characterised by respect, patience, honesty and kindness. One online comment stating that, ‘Hot Rabbi is a walking green flag,’ speaks for thousands who simply want to be treated well by those they trust. Another claims, ‘This show healed something in me.’ Noah and Joanne’s story not only defies convention around community and social expectations, but it bucks the trend with its non-toxic approach to dating and religion. In the face of a sabotaging ex-girlfriend, an unconvinced sister, and the giant conversion-shaped question-mark over their future, the two persist by continually choosing and honouring one another. 

The ultimate strength of Nobody Wants This is that it is founded in a story that seeks its worth in more than just sex. Sure, sex and sexual attraction eventually plays a large role in the plot, but how many romantic comedies save their most tender scene for a powerful moment of humble prayer, instead of a passionate kiss? Nobody Wants This presents the viewer with a better possibility, both of life as it is now and life as it could be. Through Joanne, the person who wants something more meaningful is afforded a front-row seat in exploring religion. Even to the total newbie, there is no judgment or embarrassment – and you’d be hard-pressed to find a person who’d get it as wrong as her, making the sign of the cross in a synagogue. Through Noah, our faith in mankind and religion institution is restored as we witness his honesty, patience and kindness. Surely, this cannot be bad press for any place of worship.