Donald Trump biopic The Apprentice still trying to get into theaters pre-election

As November 5 draws closer and election talk becomes less and less escapable, the team behind The Apprentice, the Donald Trump biopic starring Sebastian Stan and Jeremy Strong as Roy Cohn, is still trying to get the film on screens before people start casting votes. Those efforts got a major boost this morning as the Ali Abassi-directed film was acquired by Briarcliff Entertainment, which is now aiming for an October 11 U.S. release and an awards push for the film. 

This is per The Hollywood Reporter, which acknowledges that six weeks is not a hell of a lot of time to roll out a major motion picture. However, pushing a winning film, particularly one with a political slant, is something Briarcliff boss Tom Ortenberg is familiar with; the outlet notes that he helped push Crash during his time at Lionsgate and Spotlight while at Open Road. 

The Apprentice opened at Cannes in May and was received fairly warmly by critics. Comparing it to the 2016 film Barry, critic Jason Gorber wrote in his A.V. Club review that “the tale of Trump and Cohn is both far more intricately realized and also far more sinister in its universal tale of the nature of power, influence, and betrayal.” But the film had some predictable and naysayers, namely Trump and his campaign team, who launched a cease and desist as the film premiered at Cannes. While the film at large is hardly a flattering portrait of the former president, a scene where the character rapes his then-wife Ivana Trump (played here by Borat 2’s Maria Bakalova) has been specifically controversial. Additionally, a billionaire investor in The Apprentice was apparently surprised that the film was so unflattering, and tried to block the film’s release via his Kinematics production and finance company. As of this morning, those efforts look pretty unsuccessful, though it would not be surprising to see a few more legal challenges launched in the next six or so weeks.