Melania

There's a version of a documentary about Melania Trump that could have been genuinely fascinating. Here is a woman who grew up in communist-era Yugoslavia, modelled her way across Europe, landed in New York, and ultimately became the First Lady of the United States (twice). Melania, the Amazon-funded documentary directed by Brett Ratner, is not that film.

Instead, the film tracks the 20 days leading up to Donald Trump's second inauguration, covering the planning, the fittings, the candlelight dinners. It is, in the truest sense of the word, a coffee table book brought to life, beautiful to glance at, immediately forgettable, and never meant to be read. Melania Trump is never without a full face of makeup or a high heel throughout the entire runtime, always impeccably put together, no hair out of place, which might be admirable discipline, or might be exactly the problem.

The film was made with Melania herself as executive producer, with full editorial control. That fact alone should tell you everything. It is her story, and as its leading lady and executive producer, she tells it the way she wants, peppered with needle drops from her favourite songs, including Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean." There's nothing wrong with controlling your own narrative, but when you control it this tightly, then there's something wrong. Or there's nothing, we could say...

There are brief moments where something real nearly breaks through. The camera catches Melania in moments where she seems happy, singing along to "Billie Jean" with her driver, appearing genuinely comfortable when interacting with designer Hervé Pierre or French first lady Brigitte Macron. Those seconds are oddly compelling precisely because they feel unguarded. But the film doesn't trust them. It cuts away, returns to the slow-motion walk, the lingering shot of stiletto heels on marble floors. If you've seen the trailer for {The Devil Wears Prada 2}, prominently featuring shots of heels walking down corridors, you've got the general gist of what Ratner is going for here.

The movie opens to the strains of the Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter," which makes it sound like the film is going to strike an attitude of defiance. But Melania is so studiously celebratory, it never even wades into controversial waters. There is no mention of the immigration policies championed by her husband, despite her own immigrant story. There's a telling moment where she selects glassware to engrave with a presidential seal and alludes to "my home country" (she was born in what is now Slovenia) without ever naming it. The film, much like its subject, hovers just above the details.

At one point, she drops by as Donald Trump rehearses his inaugural speech and suggests he call himself "a peacemaker and a unifier." He incorporates it. In the film, this plays to a burst of applause, with a grateful nod to his wife. That's not quite how it played out in reality as the applause and the nod are editing tricks. It's a small manipulation, but a revealing one. This is a film unbothered by the distinction between truth and optics.

The business context around the film is, frankly, more interesting than the film itself. Amazon paid $40 million for distribution rights (the highest price ever paid for a commissioned documentary) and reportedly spent another $35 million on marketing. That makes Melania arguably the most expensive infomercial in history. Speculation about what Amazon was really purchasing (access, goodwill, political cover) will outlast the film itself by decades.

Critics gave it an 11% on Rotten Tomatoes, while verified ticket buyers gave it 99%, the biggest gap between critics and audiences in the site's history. That split says more about the current state of America than the film does. The people who loved it came to love it, the people who didn't, didn't go. And, as we previously noted, almost all positive reviews come from accounts yet to review any other project.

Ultimately, Melania is not offensive, it's not even particularly infuriating once you've adjusted your expectations. It is simply, stubbornly, magnificently empty. An elegantly wrapped box with nothing inside, asking to be admired for the ribbon.