"The Apprentice" depicts the life and popularity of Donald Trump in upper-class New York in the 1970s. The work was shown on Monday night (local time 20.5) at the Cannes Film Festival, in front of a large audience and famous artists, including Cate Blanchett and Bella Hadid.
According to the New York Post, the film received a warm welcome with endless fireworks lasting from 8 to 11 minutes.
In the film, Sebastian Stan plays Trump as a young man, when he meets powerful lawyer Roy Cohn ( jeremy Strong) and his first wife, Ivana Trump (Maria Bakalova).
Although the film revealed Trump's political ambitions at that time, it did not mention the 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns or the four years he lived in the White House.
Premiered in Cannes, "The Apprentice" created many shocks for the audience. The film depicts the scene of a former US president getting fat and hair transplanted. In another controversial scene, Trump was accused of brutally raping his wife, Ivana.
Accordingly, the film has a scene where Ivana Quynh gave her husband a book about women's sexuality. However, Trump showed no interest and told his wife that he was no longer attracted to her.
The two fell into controversy, after which Trump threw Ivana to the ground and angrily rushed at his wife. He also coldly mocked and sexually assaulted Ivana in both action and speech.
The scene immediately had a fierce controversy. A female audience member in her 20s called this a "rude" and "raped" scene. Many viewers who are other women also agreed and thought this was a condemnable sexual assault.
Previously, Trump's ex-wife actually accused him of sexually assaulting her in her divorce in 1989. However, she later withdrew the lawsuit in 2015, when Trump was running for president. Ivana passed away in 2022.
The Apprentice also attracted a lot of attention and mixed opinions from critics and audiences. Variety called the work a humane documentary about a man defamed by half of the United States. The film is also entertaining and not too bold about Donald Trump's youth."
On the other hand, The Guardian rated The Apprentice as a cartoon and only gave it a rating of 2/5 stars.
According to Variety, billionaire Dan Snyder, a friend of Trump, invested in the film and was angry to see the results in February this year. He said this was no different from a garbled portrait of the 45th president.
The Apprentice is not currently distributed for screening in the US.
