<\/p>\n
What\u2019s the difference between Brett Ratner<\/a> and Leni Riefenstahl? Riefenstahl, for all her many sins, was technically innovative; Ratner (unless you count an almost fetishistic fascination with first lady footwear), not so much.<\/p>\n But in the end, they are both political propagandists, collaborators if you will, with heads of state determined to create a narrative that is, at best, at odds with reality and, at worst, a targeted attempt to distort it.<\/p>\n Am I saying that \u201cMelania\u201d<\/a> is as horrifically significant as \u201cTriumph of the Will\u201d? No, I am not. But it is motivated by the same base forces, and as fun as it might be to watch Jeff Bezos<\/a> lose most of the $75 million Amazon paid for the purchase and then marketing of the film, it is important to remember that.<\/p>\n As Melania Trump said herself at the film\u2019s premiere<\/a>: \u201cSome have called this a documentary. It is not. It is a creative experience that offers perspectives, insights and moments.\u201d<\/p>\n A \u201ccreative experience\u201d for which the first lady, who serves as narrator and executive producer, reportedly received about $28 million.<\/p>\n Money she very much does not earn.<\/p>\n Read more:<\/b> Melania Trump \u2014 her doppelganger \u2014 makes appearance at L.A. matinee of first lady’s documentary<\/a><\/p>\n Anyone who goes into \u201cMelania\u201d hoping to see even a glimpse of what it is like to be first lady, or indeed Melania Trump, will find instead a super-long version of \u201cwe followed [fill in the blank] as they got ready for the Oscars.\u201d<\/p>\n Only in this case, it\u2019s Donald Trump\u2019s second inauguration, which Ratner (given his first big job since being accused by six women of sexual misconduct<\/a>) frames as the Second Coming, from the lingering shots of the sleek lines of the motorcade to the use of \u201cHis truth is marching on\u201d from \u201cBattle Hymn of the Republic\u201d as the first couple takes the stage at one of the inaugural balls.<\/p>\n (And in case you think that\u2019s not obsequious enough, at the end of the inaugural festivities, Ratner, off camera, says, \u201csweet dreams, Mr. President,\u201d which honestly could have been the title of this film.)<\/p>\n Most of the \u201caction\u201d involves the first lady making entrances: off private jets, out of big black cars and into well-appointed rooms. There, Trump and her designers wax rhapsodic over a gown<\/a> designed to disguise any seams, admire an inaugural dinner menu that begins with caviar in a big golden egg and discuss the furnishings that will be moved in as soon as the Bidens move out.<\/p>\n These mind-numbing glories are interrupted just long enough for Tham Kannalikham<\/a>, an interior designer in charge of the White House transition, to talk about how her family immigrated to America from Laos when she was 2 \u2014 the opportunity to work in the White House is, for her, the ultimate American dream. Beside her, Trump, also an immigrant, remains silent.<\/p>\n Read more:<\/b> ‘Melania’ documentary, helmed by controversial filmmaker, arrives amid national turmoil<\/a><\/p>\n Other things happen. Trump has a video conference with French First Lady Brigitte Macron to discuss initiatives to end cyberbullying, meets with Queen Rania of Jordan to discuss helping foster children and comforts former Hamas hostage Aviva Siegel. Siegel, whose husband, at the time of filming, is still a hostage, provides the film\u2019s one real emotional moment, despite having been clearly included as an opportunity for Trump to reveal a bit of personal kindness (and some political messaging).<\/p>\n We follow Trump as she and her husband attend Jimmy Carter\u2019s funeral, during which her narration describes the pain of her mother\u2019s death the year before, and as she \u201csneaks\u201d the cameras into a room where her husband is rehearsing his inaugural speech.<\/p>\n There she suggests, with a completely straight face, that he add the word \u201cunifier\u201d to \u201cpeacemaker\u201d in his description of what he hopes to be his legacy, a term he then uses in his speech the next day.<\/p>\n Throughout it all, the first lady remains relentlessly poised and personally inaccessible, lending new and literal meaning to the term “statuesque.”<\/p>\n Given the nature of the film\u2019s subject, and the fact that she is the one literally calling the shots, no one with half a brain could expect to see any interesting or authentic \u201cbehind-the-scenes\u201d moments (Melania wearing sweats or counting her breakfast almonds or, I don\u2019t know, sneezing). A brief scene in which the remarkably tone-deaf Ratner attempts to get her to sing along to her favorite song, Michael Jackson\u2019s \u201cBillie Jean,\u201d elicits (finally!) a genuine laugh from her, and while his decision to repeatedly zoom in on her admittedly well-shod feet becomes increasingly creepy, it at least offers drinking-game potential.<\/p>\n Even so, \u201cMelania\u201d is as cynical a piece of filmmaking as exists since the art form began.<\/p>\n Read more:<\/b> L.A. Metro relocates buses with ‘Melania’ ads after ‘extensive and severe’ vandalism<\/a><\/p>\n Listening to her describe the seriousness with which she takes her duties; her love, as an immigrant, for this great nation; and her dedication to making life better for all Americans \u2014 especially children and families \u2014 I was reminded of the climactic scene in \u201cA Wrinkle in Time,\u201d when young Charles Wallace has been ensnared by the soothing rhetoric of the evil brain-washing IT.<\/p>\n The superficial blandness of \u201cMelania\u201d isn\u2019t boring; it\u2019s calculated, infuriating and horrifying.<\/p>\n The first lady is describing an alternative universe of peace, love and unity while her husband has unleashed armed Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to terrorize and detain children and adults (many of whom are citizens or here in this country legally) and, in at least two cases, kill American citizens who protest their actions. She wants to help children and families while her husband slashes federal assistance programs and holds school funding hostage. She would have us believe she is battling cyberbullies while her husband, the president of these United States, regularly engages in lies, direct threats and character assassination on social media.<\/p>\n President Trump is many things but he is not a unifier \u2014 he believes, as he has assured us time and again, in winning<\/i>, and, as he has also said and shown, he will choose retribution over reconciliation every time.<\/p>\n Melania Trump is, of course, not her husband. But this film is little more than a 90-minute campaign ad. Which, given the fact that Trump cannot legally run for president again, should be cause for much concern.<\/p>\n Many criticized the decision to release \u201cMelania\u201d mere days after federal agents killed Alex Pretti and Renee Good in Minneapolis, and excoriated those notables, including Apple CEO Tim Cook,<\/a> who chose to attend an early celebratory screening that included \u201clet them eat” cookies with \u201cMelania\u201d scrawled in the icing.<\/p>\n For the kind of person who makes, and buys and distributes, a film that purports to be a \u201cdocumentary\u201d and is really just old-fashioned, through-the-looking-glass propaganda, however, it\u2019s actually the perfect time.<\/p>\n Why worry about the federal government killing its own citizens when we can all ooh and aah over the fact that the first lady\u2019s inaugural gown is constructed so that none of the seams show? Especially if it makes her husband happy.<\/p>\n