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Bravely Really?
should you find the fortitude to watch Melania once the documentary inevitably hits Prime Video, there’s much to learn about how American fascism is currently using cinema. As the premier manufacturer of caffeine-free Michael Bay imitations, Brett Ratner (disgraced director and friend of the Trump family) attempts to use the most basic storytelling grammar to write his run-on political sentence. Melania Trump is contextualized within a hero’s journey and surrounded by movement as she struts through set pieces from American history. Politics dissolve into the background, like eugenics into Ratner’s X-Men: The Last Stand. The definition of an American becomes akin to the French taxi driver from Ratner’s Rush Hour 3, who swears allegiance to Starbucks and bloodlust. To be American isn’t a state of citizenship; it’s a state of mind. Yet Ratner neglects to include other crucial elements of red-blooded four-quadrant fare, such as a plot built on cause and effect, centered on a likable protagonist. Observing Melania‘s uniquely legible failure reveals a clear attempt by the current administration to use the elements of American action filmmaking as a corrective framework for how it would like to be viewed by the public.
