“Melania,” a documentary that follows the first lady during the 20 days leading up to Donald Trump’s second presidential inauguration, will begin streaming on Amazon Prime Video on March 9th.
The film was directed by Brett Ratner, who is best known for directing the first three Rush Hour movies before he was accused of sexual misconduct, including rape, by multiple people in 2017. “Melania” will be the first project he has directed since the allegations that led many in the entertainment industry to cut ties with him.
The Trump family received a much-publicized paycheck when Amazon MGM Studios bought the rights to “Melania” for $75 million. Although the documentary lost in theaters, it still performed better than expected at the box office, grossing $7 million in its opening weekend and later grossing $16.6 million. Older white women were the primary audience.
“Melania” received poor reviews, receiving an 11% rating among critics on Rotten Tomatoes. A Variety review called the film a “cheeseball infomercial of incredible inertia,” and chief film critic Owen Gleiberman wrote, “‘Melania’ is a documentary that will never happen.” “It’s a ‘portrait’ of the first lady of the United States, but it’s so orchestrated, airbrushed, and stage-managed that it barely rises to the level of a shameless infomercial. Cheesy? It has its moments, but it’s mostly lethargic. It feels like the most innocuous clippings from a reality show spliced together. There’s no drama to this. It should have been called ‘Day of the Day.'” A Living Tradwife. ”
However, among the target audience, the film did well. “Melania” received a score of 98% on Rotten Tomatoes’ “Popcornmeter,” which measures the sentiment of verified ticket buyers.
