The director behind the upcoming Donald Trump that has caused a big splash at the Cannes Film Festival has made a surprising claim about the project.
Ali Abbasi’s movie The Apprentice received a prolonged standing ovation when it premiered at Cannes on Monday night, and has already divided critical opinion down the middle.
Speaking to journalists at a press conference after the screening, Ali insisted he doesn’t think the film is one that Trump himself “would dislike”.
“I don’t necessarily think he would like it,” he clarified. “But I think he’d be surprised. So I’m happy to meet him, have a screening and then we can discuss it afterwards.”
While Trump is yet to respond publicly to the film – which is said to be “based on real events” with fictional elements – his team has already threatened legal action.
The spokesperson for Trump’s current presidential campaign, has already rubbished the film, calling it “garbage” and “pure fiction which sensationalises lies that have been long debunked”.
Trump’s rep also branded the film “election interference by Hollywood elites”, claiming it “should not see the light of day” and belongs “in a dumpster fire” as it “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”.
Scenes in The Apprentice depict Trump (played by Pam & Tommy’s Sebastian Stan) taking diet pills, undergoing cosmetic surgery and sexually assaulting his wife.
The latter scene is inspired by an incident detailed by Ivana Trump during her 1990 divorce proceedings, which she initially described as “rape”, per The Guardian.
In a statement three years later, Ivana said: “On one occasion during 1989, Mr Trump and I had marital relations in which he behaved very differently towards me than he had during our marriage.
“As a woman, I felt violated, as the love and tenderness, which he normally exhibited towards me, was absent. I referred to this as a ‘rape’, but I do not want my words to be interpreted in a literal or criminal sense.”
Trump previously referred to his ex-wife’s account as “obviously false”.