“The Apprentice” (2024) has been one of the most controversial releases at the 2024 Cannes Film Festival, receiving mixed reviews from critics, with most praising Sebastian Stan’s performance as Donald Trump but criticizing the story of his rise to the top of the business world it tries to convey as lazy and hollow.
A depiction of a rape scene involving Donald Trump and Ivana Trump (Maria Bakalova), his first wife, has in itself sparked controversy. Steven Cheung, a spokesperson for Trump’s 2024 presidential election campaign, claimed the film to be “malicious defamation” and suggested that it is nothing more than “election interfering by Hollywood elites.”
However, another interesting development is that Dan Snyder, the former owner of the Washington Commanders NFL team and someone who donated money both to the film’s production and to Trump’s 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns, is demanding that the film be recut. He initially donated money with the impression that the film would be a positive portrayal of the former, and perhaps future, president and his close personal friend.
After seeing a cut in February 2024, he was enraged at the depiction and attempted to get one of the production companies of the film, “Kinematics,” to fight the release. Kinematics of one of many companies involved with the film; however, Snyder felt personally slighted, demanding certain elements of the film be changed or scrapped entirely, including the aforementioned rape sequence.
Whether he will be successful or not is up in the air, as the legal battle is still ongoing. However, combined with Donald Trump’s campaign team’s threat of a lawsuit, things are not looking good for the project. Ali Abbasi has shrugged off the responses of these very powerful and influential figures, claiming Trump would not “dislike the movie” and stating that he would happily screen the film for Trump.
