A third of the way through Melania, Amazon’s very expensive film about the current first lady of the US – a first lady who, we’re left in no doubt, is the greatest first lady in the history of first ladies – one of the subject’s aides reads out an email from a journalist, asking about the film. “I would like to understand how this all came together,” he asks. Mate, we allwould.
Although of course we know. The film was commissioned in order to suck up to Melania’s husband, Donald Trump. And not just to suck up. Amazon paid $40 million, the most ever paid for a documentary. Of that, $28 million went straight to the president’s wife. Is there a word for this sort of thing? A few spring to mind. But look, Jeff Bezos has got a lot of business interests. Think of it as an investment, or, if you prefer, protection money.
Amazon is said to have spent as much again on marketing. The film has had a spot on the Piccadilly Circus screens. But when I asked if there would be the usual advance screening, there was no response. Fortunately, Vue cinemas in the UK are showing it, so I went to the first sitting I could find on Friday. The staff seemed baffled by the film’s presence. There were two other people in the screening.
The film itself has the air of an expensive corporate video. Like everything involving Trump, there is cross-promotion. We are shown that Mar-a-Lago has a pool and a golf course and tennis courts, and then Melania tells us that Mar-a-Lago has a pool and a golf course and tennis courts. You too can enjoy a visit to Mar-a-Lago, with its pool and golf course and tennis courts, at low, low rates. Assuming you don’t get arrested on your way into the country.
Melania, a producer on the film, delivers a narration that is flat and expressionless, neatly matching her face, which is remarkably smooth for her 55 years. It is also weirdly immobile throughout: it is a good hour before the camera catches what seems to be an actual feeling, a look of nerves as she prepares on the morning of the inauguration.
There is one faintly candid interview, as she sits in the back of the car, discussing her love of Michael Jackson. “He was very sweet,” she said. “Very nice.” It’s possible that Mrs Trumpisn’t a terrific judge of men.
It is moments like this which feed a suspicion that the film is a work of epic satire, as when Melania tells us she is going to redecorate the White House with “timeless elegance”, while strolling through an apartment decorated in the classic Trump style of gold with gold highlights. We cut to a discussion of how guests at the inauguration will be served caviar in gold eggs.
She meets an interior designer to discuss their plans for the executive mansion. “I honour the importance of the White House,” drones Melania. Sadly there is no time to get into the factthat within months, bulldozers will be tearing into it.
“Everyone should do what they can to protect our individual rights,” the star intones. “Never take them for granted.” Words which certainly hit home for Americans in January 2026.
Jimmy Carter died just before filming began. The passing of a president afforded the filmmakers an opportunity to discuss with their subject the passing nature of political life, and the importance of a legacy. This is an opportunity that is determinedly ignored, with the only comment on Carter being Melania’s annoyance at having to travel to Washington for his funeral.
This brings the Trumps together on screen for the first time. Despite the filmmakers’ efforts toportray them as a happy couple, the Trumps appear to live separate lives, with, it is hinted, separate bedrooms. “I’ll see you tomorrow,” the president tells his wife at the end of the inauguration day. “Goodnight,” she says. Not even a kiss.
So how does the first lady fill her days? “I have already started my planning for the inauguration,” she says near the start. A whole three weeks before it happens, eh? We quickly learn that Melania is the cause of planning by others, rather than a planner herself. Not that her involvement is trivial. She is shown the invitations to the event. “Your colour red, which you chose,” someone gushes, “which is so beautiful”.
There is an awful lot of this sort of crawling. At one stage, a presidential aide tells Donald that there will be “the standard presidential parade” before hastily correcting himself: “I shouldn’t say standard. It’s a little bit bigger and a little bit better.”
And it’s not just flunkies. The Trumps have introduced a pre-inauguration event for the administration’s high-rollers, a chance, Melania tells us, to admire “the elegance and sophistication of our donors”. Here we can see men worth many billions grovelling before the president. What is the point of being so rich if you still have to go through all that?
Which brings us back where we came in. This film all came together because even the richest have things to fear from the subject’s husband. The significance of Melania isn’t the contents of the film so much as the fact that it happened. It’s not impossible that it might be evidence in an impeachment trial. And in any case, it is an important document in the decline of American public life.
