Axar.az presents an article, "Melania " by John Samuel Tieman.

I saw the “Melania” movie. I suppose I could be one of those “two hours I'll never get back” critics. And, in fact, I just couldn't watch it all in one sitting. But that doesn't mean I didn't learn a few things about our First Lady, Melania Trump. She and Donald Trump seem to have genuine affection for each other. She's intelligent. The customs and rituals of the First Lady, these she does well. She's got a great facade. But I was left with more stuff unknown rather than known. Little of her internal life is revealed. The facade is all. She uses fashion and her beauty as an exoskeleton.

The movie is directed by Brad Ratner and funded by Jeff Bezos. It is available on cable. It covers about three weeks before the 2026 Inauguration of her husband. The movie ends on Inauguration Day. It was made with her full editorial control.

It purports to be a documentary. There are no great revelations. To the extent that this documents anything, it is the First Lady's fitness for her role, her guardedness and the aesthetics that surround that guardedness. The film features no friends, pets, hobbies. She almost exclusively interacts with political associates, staff and fashion advisors. Her control is constant and curiously contrasts with the chaos of her husband.

Critics almost universally pan the movie. You hear terms like gaudy, unrevealing, grotesque. I don't disagree. Melania is described as Sphinx-like, robotic, and again I don't disagree. I've also read where “Melania” is compared to “Triumph Of The Will”. With that I agree and disagree. Leni Riefenstahl, the producer and director of “Triumph Of The Will”, was one of the most innovative propagandists in human history. “Melania”, not so much. That said, the “Melania” movie is as calculating as “Triumph Of The Will”. Both movies have the same purpose: to showcase their protagonist. Both movies also present almost nothing of the inner lives of their subjects.

Perhaps my biggest surprise was that I kind of like Melania. There are these flashes of insight you get when she is, for a moment, unguarded. When she sings “Billie Jean”, for example, or when she sings “YMCA”. She seems like someone it might be fun to spend some time with. But those unguarded moments last for, literally, seconds.

The rest of the time, all you see is the exterior. The dual purposes – to show her sense of decorum, and to shield her inner life – these are goals accomplished. It raises more questions than it answers. But the movie isn't about answers. The movie is about display. Melania shows us the rituals, symbols, and hierarchies of the First Lady's life. And she shows us how she has mastered them all. But never once does she address, for instance, her anxieties. Her defenses are so dense and so developed as to be impenetrable to the observer, even someone who has observed her for two hours.

It's worth saying that what I am expressing here is both a state of knowing and a state of unknowing, mostly unknowing. I watched the movie and didn't learn much that I didn't already know. She and the president seem to share a genuine affection. That surprised me a little. I'm unable to tell how deeply that goes. She is quite intelligent, that surprised me, but she isn't learned, which didn't surprise me. She seems like someone it might be fun to spend a little time with. I came away liking her, and that really surprised me. In the end, all she presents is a facade, a beautiful and competent facade. The biggest questions I have concern her inner life. I watched “Melania”. But I walked away not knowing Melania.